


All The Cracks In My Skin Just Let The Light In

by thaxatos



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, M/M, Psychological issues, be prepared to have your heart broken, i don't even know what to tag besides angst honestly, oikawa has hallucinations, oikawa is a physics professor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-27
Updated: 2018-05-27
Packaged: 2019-05-14 14:07:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14771117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thaxatos/pseuds/thaxatos
Summary: “I remember you too! Oh my God, I remembered something!”Euphoria is rushing through Tooru’s body as adrenaline speeds up his pulse again. The headache suddenly forgotten like his address.“Man,” Kuroo lets his arm slump into his lap as his head rolls back, “why did you remember him first?”Tooru can see that the corners of his lips are tucked upwards, but still, he knows that tears are running down his face too.It seems impossible to forget such vibrant and colorful personalities that stuck through a lot of shit with you.Kuroo shows him pictures on the phone while Bokuto comments on them and Tooru can feel the adrenaline wearing off, nursing his limbs into a slumber. He drifts in and out of sleep, but before he’s completely unconscious, he grasps a piece from the silent conversation. It seems the doctor is back.“It’s good that he remembers you. It’s a good sign,” Tooru hears the scratching of a ball pen being dragged over paper, “do you want to tell him?”Tell me what?There’s a long pause before Kuroo speaks up. A pause in which the ticking of the clock seems pressuring.“No, we can’t tell him.”Tooru’s mind shuts off and he drifts into a restless sleep.





	All The Cracks In My Skin Just Let The Light In

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why I wrote this, but here it is anyways. 
> 
> The title is from the song Happy Hurts by Icon For Hire. 
> 
> Have fun!

“Shallow pulse! Hurry up and get him into the ambulance!” 

Ambulance? And who is that? He has never heard this voice before. At least he thinks he hasn’t. He can’t even grasp a normal thought.

There are faint noises in the background, sounding far away and washed, and is he underwater? Can he even swim? 

Everything sounds like it’s been recorded and then played to him three times slower. 

His eyes are heavy, like someone tied weights to his lids. He can feel them flutter in vain to keep his eyes open. 

There are damp noises of breathing. As if someone is pumping air into his lungs with his bare hands. All of a sudden he can feel every breath he takes and he doesn’t remember, but it doesn’t seem normal. 

The noises around him get clearer. 

Loud mechanical beeping rings through his head. He doesn’t even want to open his eyes anymore. 

Something is lifting him up and pushing him back into something soft with a strong grip on his shoulders. He wants to say something, but god damn it, he can’t even open his mouth. 

He can feel his eyes roll back and he’s sure he will see his brain soon. 

His legs feel like someone pushed rusted nails through them. It’s like there is water in his head. Too much of it. It will surely explode soon. 

“Get the oxygen.”

Another voice. A different one. How many people are here? 

Oxygen? Why? He’s breathing,isn’t it? Or is he dead? Why? 

Desperately he tries to open his mouth, but not a single word drops out of it. Only noises that are closest to a dying elk. 

Something akin to a soft ring is pushed over his mouth. He tries to shake it off but it’s fixated to his head. He doesn’t feel like he’s breathing anymore.

Oh. It was just oxygen. 

Hands are all over him. Cold air hits some of the exposed skin. The loud noise of scissors cutting through cloth echoes in his head. 

Loud and shrill screaming mingles itself to the noise, and good God, his head hurts like a bitch. He squeezes his eyes shut hoping it helps him ignore the sting in his head. 

His eye is spread open and a face pops up in front of him.

He sure as hell doesn’t know who that is.

A face with more liver spots than normal skin looks down at him. He probably has more hair as eyebrows than on his head. The white of his beard is hurting his eyes.

The old man looks away before bringing his arm up and lighting into his eye with possibly the brightest lamp ever. He fights against the fingers keeping his eyes open, but there’s no use to it. 

He wants to scream at him to fuck off and just get him some ibuprofen. 

“His pupils are good, how are his vital stats?”

Great, I don’t know, can you please take the lamp out of my face now? Thanks. 

Finally the gazing light is gone from his eye and he’s allowed to close it again. He can still see specks of white. 

The man is gone and he’s met with an indifferent ceiling that’s so white it hurts more than the man’s hair. 

Voices are chiming in the background, words he can’t make out are thrown around the room and suddenly there’s a loud noise, like a door being slammed into the frame by an infuriated teenage daughter who didn’t get the newest iPhone. 

Then the whole earth shakes and everything moves. 

No. That’s wrong. The earth isn’t shaking. 

He is in the ambulance. The ambulance just took off.

It would be cool if someone finally told him what the fuck is going on. 

“Can you hear me?”

Oh, the Albert Einstein look alike is back. 

He nods. 

“Do you know who you are?” 

He freezes. 

Every word is like a bullet entering his chest. One after the other is being launched into his ribcage, tearing lungs, heart and everything else to shreds. 

Have they thrown him into ice water or why is it suddenly so cold? Why does he feel so cold while pearls of sweat are running down his forehead? 

Helplessly, he shakes his head and squeezes his eyes shut. 

Maybe to ignore the pain, maybe to hold back the tears.

 

He doesn’t know how long he has already been here, but it’s driving him crazy already. Most of all because he could neither move nor talk for the greater part. 

At first he thought he’s paralyzed, but the doctor told him he has a mild catatonia. Even though he doesn’t see it as ‘mild’. 

But he managed to say a few sentences today, so maybe the worst is over.

And now he’s trying to adjust to the fact that he is Oikawa Tooru, 32 years old, physics professor at Tokyo University, survivor of a car crash, and now suffering from amnesia. 

How long has he been staring at the tiled wall with exactly 23 white tiles, 10 blue tiles and 33 black tiles, that also have lots of old specks on them? He knows that as much as he knows the name of his mother.

“You have a good chance to recover fully. You need a few people to get you your personal stuff. It triggers your memories, you know? Do you know someone we can call for that?”

That’s another doctor. Not the Einstein from the ambulance and earlier. This one is much younger, much taller, much more disgusting. 

Without so much as even looking at Tooru, he reads away on his stupid notepad, telling him some of the most shocking things with a voice he probably orders his food. 

Tooru just blinks at him before he’s able to free himself from the trance. 

“Of course I don’t know anyone you can call. Did you forget that you just told me that I have amnesia? Maybe you have it.” 

Great idea. Being rude to your doctor on the first day already. But hey, he got a coherent sentence out. Now he just needs to be able to move the lower part of his body and he’s gone. 

At least he manages to trigger some emotion in the man’s face. Even though it’s just a disgusted twitch of his lips. It’s enough for Tooru. 

“I’m sorry, sir.” The man that stands as if he has a stick up his ass presses through gritted teeth and stomps off and Tooru is all alone in the white room full of white noises. 

He has no idea what to do with himself. Kneading the blanket between his fingers gets boring after a few minutes, so he tries to stand up. You can’t forget how to walk or even stand. 

His feet touch the gray tiles of the floor, sending shiver after shive up his spine. Still supported by the rusty hospital bed, he stands up. 

Pushing his hands into his face he straightens up to his full height, hearing the satisfying cracks of his spine being finally used again. 

Great. Now he still doesn’t know what to do.

But he’s standing.

Still lounging around in the middle of the room with his hands steadily on his hips, he gazes around. He must look like someone who is ready to get shit done. 

If only that were the case.

But the door slams open and he’s back sitting on the bed with his heart in his ears.

Owlishly he blinks at the two figures entering the room and is it even allowed to he that irascible.

“Oh my god, Oikawa! We finally found you!” The one that looks like he just crawled out of the bed screams at him, staring at him with glossy eyes. 

His chest is heaving as if a hummingbird is trapped in it. 

“We were sick with worry!”

Golden orbs stare at him and there is not enough space between them.

There is something familiar about them, but Tooru doesn’t remember. 

Now the weirdness of amnesia only kicks in. 

He could have known them for decades, but doesn’t know a thing about them. It’s frightening. What else doesn’t he know. 

Oh god, the hammer in his head is back. 

“Who are you?” he asks and he must sound like a lost child.

“Yeah, very funny. Stop acting. When will you get out of this cubicle of boredom?” 

The voice is so familiar, but there is nothing behind that feeling and it makes Tooru sick to the stomach.

How can he forget people that look like their haircut was designed after beauty brushes? 

His breathing quickens and maybe he’s hyperventilating, but there’s no certainty behind it as the only thing he can think of is the swarm of hornets dancing through his head. 

Thank god a young girl clad in white rushes into the room, coming for his rescue. 

“Oikawa, please get back into the bed, you need to rest,” methodically the words tumble out of her mouth as she pushes him into the mattress and tucks him in with trained movements, “and the two of you,” she turns around, pointing her finger accusingly at the intruders, “calm down or get out, he needs calm,” she hisses. 

Tooru is sure he can see their hair doing the anime thing where they just flop down a little in sadness. 

He smirks and as they still don’t answer the nurse shuffles annoyed and keeps going, even though a little softer. 

“He has amnesia, if you are friends, please be calm, he’s currently very stressed. If you have pictures, show him so he can remember. Don’t worry, it’s temporary. The doctor will come over later and tell you more if you are his only relations.” 

Oh great, the doctor will come back. Has his life always been a shitshow?

The nurse sighs and walks out of the room, closing the door behind her. 

What she left are a human burrito and two very confused and frightened looking makeup brushes. 

“You really don’t remember anything?” the white haired asks and Tooru shakes his head. His heart rate slows down a little. 

They come closer, taking a seat in the probably most uncomfortable looking chairs beside his bed. 

“I know my name, age, occupation and that I have amnesia. Now, who are you?” 

They both look deeply hurt by the question, but only for a short moment. 

“I’m Kuroo Tetsurou and this is Bokuto Koutarou. We’ve been friends since college. We have done a lot of shit together and got away with it, of course.” The black haired says with a cheshire grin. 

Hearing this is strange. Tooru doesn’t know how much they know about him. How can he have forgotten who he is? How can he have forgotten friendships? There are two people in front of him he doesn’t know, but who probably know a lot more about him than he himself. 

“How did you find me?” he asks just to ignore the tingling in his nerves.

Kuroo speaks up again and Tooru doesn’t think Bokuto is always that quiet, “I’m your emergency contact. They called me today.” 

Tooru just nods while keeping up his staring contest with the wall across of his bed. 

Both of his visitors look down on their shoes, abashed, no one speaks a word and the only sound is the steady dripping of the leaky faucet. 

“Hey! We should show you some pictures like the nurse said, maybe you will remember!” 

Bokuto states excitedly with sparks of hope in his eyes. He looks so sure about being able to trigger Tooru’s memories. He really wants to remember. Letting Bokuto think that he has failed would hurt himself physically. He doesn’t want Bokuto’s nightmare become true. 

After all that’s what Bokuto is afraid of the most: Disappointing people. But gladly Akaashi helps him a lot with that. 

Tooru’s eyes widen. Lifting his head he looks directly at Bokuto’s face, grinning from ear to ear. 

“I remember you! I remember how you always paid me with milk bread to help you steal art supplies from college, I remember how I always told you about physics when you couldn’t sleep and that you always hung sticky notes with motivational words and little planets on them all over the dorm!”

Strings of words stream out of his mouth faster than his brain can even process. One by one, images of the time he spent with Bokuto tumble back into his brain and before he can realize it, tears are streaming down Bokuto’s face. 

“I thought you’d forgotten me,” he weeps into his hands. Kuroo just pats his back while looking at his phone absentmindedly, as if he didn’t even care. 

The sly bastard always acts as if he has no worries or feelings to bother him, even though everyone knows that deep down he feels more strongly than any of them. At least he shows this to Kozume. 

“I remember you too! Oh my God, I remembered something!” 

Euphoria is rushing through Tooru’s body as adrenaline speeds up his pulse again. The headache suddenly forgotten like his address. 

“Man,” Kuroo lets his arm slump into his lap as his head rolls back, “why did you remember him first?” 

Tooru can see that the corners of his lips are tucked upwards, but still, he knows that tears are running down his face too. 

“Guess I should be the emergency contact now,” Bokuto sing songs and Tooru can’t believe he has really forgotten them. 

It seems impossible to forget such vibrant and colorful personalities that stuck through a lot of shit with you. 

Kuroo shows him pictures on the phone while Bokuto comments on them and Tooru can feel the adrenaline wearing off, nursing his limbs into a slumber. He drifts in and out of sleep, but before he’s completely unconscious, he grasps a piece from the silent conversation. It seems the doctor is back. 

“It’s good that he remembers you. It’s a good sign,” Tooru hears the scratching of a ball pen being dragged over paper, “do you want to tell him?” 

Tell me what? 

There’s a long pause before Kuroo speaks up. A pause in which the ticking of the clock seems pressuring. 

“No, we can’t tell him.” 

Tooru’s mind shuts off and he drifts into a restless sleep. 

 

As he wakes up again, all orientation is lost and the concept of time doesn’t exist. Or he has forgotten about it. 

Before opening his eyes again he lingers a little longer on the feeling of knowing next to nothing about his life. 

Bokuto and Kuroo are still in his room, rapidly texting away on their phones with strained expressions. 

Tooru can’t help smirking at their compassion. He could have slept for hours and they are still here. 

“You’re awake again,” Bokuto mentions as he realizes the new, now conscious, presence in the room, “before you drifted off the doc was here. Guess what, you can go home today.”

Like always, he speaks with a grin plastered onto his face. He’s constantly seeming like a child in a candy shop. 

“But,” Kuroo inquires with a raised finger sparkling of importance, “they just have to do some check ups. Then you can go. Also, you got assigned to a new doctor. I dunno why.” 

Tooru is pretty sure he knows why. 

“So, where do I live? Do I live with someone? Please don’t tell me I’m still living with my mom.” 

His friends look at each other as if they are unsure about what to say, but eventually Kuroo manages to answer him. 

“Don’t worry. You left your parents home as soon as you could. You live in a flat. Alone.” 

Well, at least he knows that he hasn’t forgotten about a girlfriend or wife then. 

“Oikawa, could you come with me? The last examinations are waiting.” 

It’s another nurse. She wears a polite smile on her lips and seem much softer than the last one. 

He nods and gets up, following her while Bokuto screams after him that they will pack up his stuff in the meantime. 

Tooru feels stupid in the scratchy hospital outfit that was give to him. And the worst part is, it’s green. Obnoxiously green. 

Silently he follows the nurse down the many halls of the hospital until they finally reach a door that seems to be their destiny. 

Even though the walk was approximately ten minutes, Tooru is already out of breath. 

Has he ever done sports? 

Without batting an eyelash, the girl opens the door and enters it with Tooru glued to her heels. He just hopes he can sit down soon. 

Shelves with books and even more books are shoved against the walls, plants are all over the place and if Tooru wouldn’t know better, he would say the person working here is neurotic. 

There’s something familiar about this whole room. About the furniture and decorations and obvious structure. 

The room is looking like his new doctor has been to the army. Everything has it’s order. Be it the pens on his desk, ordered by color, or the papers on the desk. 

“Please, take a seat and wait till he comes,” the girl he’s already forgotten about says while leaving through the door, leaving him alone in an extremely interesting room. 

Of course Tooru doesn’t take a seat, rather, he strolls around the room and takes a look at everything. 

Most of the books are about medical things, who could have guessed that, he doesn’t even want to understand. 

Just for fun, he shoves one of the pens away from the others and keeps walking around the desk. 

Again in front of it he reads the golden plaque resting on its surface: Wakatoshi Ushijima, PhD.

Tooru moves over to the little shelve pushed against the right wall. It looks old with lots of drawers and unnecessary flourishes. 

Plants are perfectly placed on top of it, everyone apart from the other one with the exact same distance.

His eyes find an orchid and he can’t resist poking the biggest bud. 

“What are you doing there?” 

A booming voice echoes through the room. Failing to keep his composure, Tooru jerks back, bumping against the desk, looking at the tall man in the doorframe. He will deny that the undignified squeal left his mouth. 

He can feel his face heat up as he’s sitting half on top of the desk that looks like it’s worth more than his existence. Out of embarrassment he combs with his hand through his hair. 

“Nothing,” he mumbles much too fast, causing him to stumble over the letters. 

The doctor just watches him, unfazed by the whole scene as he walks into his office and behind his desk. 

Why does Tooru have to deal with the unemotional pricks?

The doctor just gestures to one of the leather chairs in front of his work space, so Tooru awkwardly shuffles to it and flops down. It’s much more comfortable than the cardboard mattress in his room. His body sinks into the smooth fabric on its own. 

Ushijima puts down the clipboard he’s been holding down, of course perfectly in the middle of the desk plate. 

“I’m sorry for letting you wait. We’re currently a little understaffed. A doctor from this ward just passed away,” he says with a sad smile while angling the pen into its position again. 

He sits down across of Tooru, folding his hands professionally on the desk while observing him. Tooru can’t get rid of the feeling of familiarity tingling his nerves. 

“What do you remember?” 

“My name, age, occupation and that I have amnesia. Oh, and I live alone. In a flat,” he stutters. Is stuttering normal for him? 

Ushijima doesn’t speak, he just keeps staring at him as if considering his next words. But something is flashing up behind his eyes, Tooru just can’t put his finger onto what. 

After taking a deep breath he finally says something. 

“We have known each other before, Oikawa.”

His feelings didn’t deceive him. Good. 

“Aoba Josai and Shiratorizawa.” 

He says it with such an authoritarian tone, Tooru feels like he’s being scolded. 

Like that one time where Ushiwaka told him he made the wrong decision by going to Johsai. 

Oh.

Images of his high school years chase through his head, leaving him in a dizzy trance. All the games, the overworking and the feelings crash into his body at once. 

He always despised Ushijima, but now he remembers that they went to college together. And they got along just fine. Even though they were by far not the perfect example for a friendship. Bickering was still a daily experience for them. 

He can’t help smiling, again. 

Is he still on drugs or why does that happen the whole time? 

“I see, you remember? I knew those words are enough to get you to remember,” his forgotten friend states with a shy smile. 

Tooru’s smile turns into a smirk. 

“How could I ever forget those years?” 

He suddenly feels much more relaxed. He didn’t even know he was tense before. Maybe he is in a constant state of tension now, but with everything more he remembers it gets better. 

Warm sunlight filters through the downed roller blinds, and as Tooru sits there, with the rare feeling of sun rays on his skin, it almost seems like a normal day. Almost, wouldn’t there be the constant feeling of not knowing where he grew up. 

Ushijima asks him some questions about his well being, which Tooru all answers truthfully: He’s fine. 

“As you already have remembered things, I guess it’s safe to say you will fully recover and only have a light head trauma,” he tells him while writing something down onto a sticky note, “Here’s the address and number to a psychologist. It can happen that you may experience anxiety or depression later or remember the accident. Your first meeting is on Friday, please go.” 

He says it as a command, but Tooru has known him long enough to recognize it as a plea. 

Tooru takes the sticky note from him and gets up. His hand already on the handle, he turns around again, but throws the thought away and leaves. 

Back in his room, everything is already packed except for a few clothes that get thrown into his face as he enters the cramped room. 

“Put those on. We’ll go now. Are you hungry?” Kuroo asks from his old place, without even looking up from his phone, “Bokuto already bought the stuff into the car, so hurry up.” 

With his monotonous voice and indifferent behavior he could be a doctor, Tooru thinks. Without complaining he shuffles into the bathroom and gets dressed. 

That’s the first time he looks into a mirror again. He doesn’t jerk back when he sees himself, he’s not startled. He didn’t forget about it, just didn’t actively think about it. 

Also, is he hungry? He hasn’t thought about it, but he also hasn’t eaten, so, sure. 

He leaves the bathroom to see a finally standing Kuroo. 

“Yes, that’s how I remember you,” he says while nodding and examining Tooru, “you dress worse than my grandpa.” 

“At least I don’t dress like I’m homeless.” 

“It’s grunge!” 

Tooru just rolls his eyes, this conversation has been held way too often. 

“Here are your glasses,” Kuroo says while extending a case to him, which Tooru gladly takes. He knew something is wrong with his vision. 

He puts them on and yes, something is very wrong with his vision. Thank God someone invented glasses. Tooru and a lot more people would be very lost without them. 

“There’s a restaurant you are really fond of nearby, wanna go there?” Kuroo asks while they wait for the elevator to stop. 

“Sure, why not?”

Bokuto is already waiting in front of the entrance doors. Walking over to him, he takes off his sunglasses. Tooru notices he seems out of breath. As if he just ran six times around the hospital. 

“Oikawa! Look,” Bokuto grabs him by the shoulders and poses him the way he wants: facing the sun directly. 

“What the hell.” He has to squeeze his eyes shut or else he will get even blinder. 

“See that ball of fire in the sky? That's the sun. It goes by many names: Apollo's lantern, day moon, old blazy. The important thing is, never to touch it.” 

“Why are you two like this? What did I do wrong.” 

Kuroo and Bokuto are both halfway doubling over from laughter. 

And as he watches them, illuminated by the sun and being just like they are, Tooru is suddenly very glad to have them. Sometimes he sees them as self-evident and doesn’t appreciate their friendship.

They get in, Tooru in the backseat, and take off. 

 

“The principal of the university called me today. He wanted to know when you would come back again. I told him I didn’t know,” Bokuto munches in between slurping soup. 

Tooru is surprised he’s not disgusted by it.

“You are on paid vacation for two weeks, but if you want to come back sooner, you should just show up,” he shrugs. 

“Well, well, well, let’s test if you still know some things about physics,” Kuroo states, pushing away his empty bowl. 

“Ok, Bo, any questions for our prof?” 

“Yes! Why do boomerangs come back?” he asks with a sincere look on his face, head askew in confusion. 

“Boomerangs work on the same principles of aerodynamics, as any other flying object. The key to how a boomerang works is the airfoil. An airfoil is flat on one side but curved on the other with one edge thicker than the other-” 

Kuroo cuts him off with the waving of his hand, eyes closed in annoyance, “Yeah, he’s fine, I think. How can you forget the names of your parents, but remember this shit?”

Tooru can only shrug, he’s confused himself. The words just poured out of his mouth, he didn’t even have to think about it. 

“Guess I’ll go to work tomorrow?” 

“Why don’t you visit your parents? You have time, after all,” Bokuto says, still hunched over his bowl like an animal. 

For a moment, Kuroo looks stunned at Bokuto as if he wasn’t expecting such a good suggestion from him. Slowly, he starts nodding.

“Yeah, yes. That’s actually a good idea. You should really do that.” 

Tooru takes a deep breath. The smell of roasted meat and herbs are filling his senses and it’s familiar. 

The red decor hanging all over the hall triggers something in him. He’s really been here often, but somehow he can’t remember why. Maybe he came here with Ushijima a few times. 

“Ok, I will go. But you need to give me the address.” 

“Don’t worry, we will. And you will get a bracelet with your name and address on it,” Kuroo says with so much sincerity, Tooru thinks he could use for his classes.

“I have retrograde amnesia and not Alzheimer’s, you prick,” he deadpans while jabbing his “friend” in the side.

While Bokuto and Kuroo are engrossed in a conversation about whether a duck or turtle could swim faster, Tooru looks around the restaurant. 

People from all social classes are gathered here. Families, business men, couples, teenagers. 

In a booth at the far end of the hall, a young man is sitting, staring at Tooru. 

Even from across the room Tooru can see that he has piercing green eyes. The stranger smiles at him, and no, his face doesn’t heat up. Of course not. 

Ok, it does. 

Oh God, he has forgotten how to flirt. 

Tooru does the only thing that seems logical to him at the moment: He sticks his tongue, shuts one eye and makes a peace sign beside his head. 

He may has forgotten how it’s done, but he’s absolutely sure that was wrong.

As he looks again, the stranger is still toothily smiling at him, maybe even brighter than Bokuto could ever. 

Tooru feels like his heart skips a beat. 

In burning embarrassment, he turns around to Bokuto and Kuroo who stare at him for the sudden movement. 

“Am I gay?” 

Tooru breathes like he just ran a marathon, his red face isn’t helping. 

It feels like the world got muted. Everything stops for a moment. 

Until Bokuto and Kuroo’s howling laughter breaks it all. They’re toppled over each other like sand sacks, acting as if Tooru just asked them if the world is flat. 

Kuroo is the first to calm down again. He wipes a stray tear away from his eye before he can speak clearly. 

“Sorry, but that was a great moment. I really need a camera that’s constantly running,” he sits up normally again and continues, “I actually don’t know what you are, I guess pan? You just told me you don’t like labels and don’t date based on gender.” 

Kuroo’s tone snaps back to upright again faster than a bullet being shot. 

Now that Kuroo says it, pictures flash through his head. Pictures of people he has dated. He can’t put names on them, but that’s not important right now. 

Tooru just nods and turns around again, searching for the hot guy he’s just seen. But he’s gone.

What a bummer.

He pouts and turns back to his friends. Bokuto is currently paying for everything, he insisted to, and as soon as that’s done, they get back into the car. 

Tooru gets a little nervous on the ride home. His home. The home he can’t remember. 

He constantly fiddles with the keys in his hand, letting them jingle and clack against each other. Until Kuroo hisses at him to cut it out.

He has moved on to picking on his skin now.

In front of the right building, two heads whip around, staring at him expectationally. Tooru looks out of the window like a deer caught in the headlights. He doesn’t even know which building is right. 

“Something ringing?”

He just shakes his head and gets out, followed by Kuroo.

“You remember that I live in the same building, right?” 

Tooru feels like he has forgotten every word he’s ever learned. He just nods. 

They say goodbye to Bokuto, take the duffle bag out of the trunk and then Kuroo starts guiding them to their building. 

High and white. That’s what Tooru’s first impressions are. No, not his first, he can’t remember his first impressions. 

The building is new inside and out and Tooru can’t wait to see his apartment. 

As it seems, he lives in the 14th floor, apartment 1401. 

In front of the right door, Tooru fumbles with the keys. Firstly, because he doesn’t know which one of them is the right, and secondly because his hands shake as if he’s freezing. 

“Oikawa, it’s the blue one,” Kuroo finally informs him while leisurely leaning against the wall.

He picks the right one and pushes it into the lock, turning until he hears the click he must have heard a thousand times before. It feels like it’s the first time. 

As soon as he steps in, he’s met with a smell that’s buried deep within his head. He knows it has been there for years. 

The apartment seems foreign though. 

“Do you want me to show you around?” Kuroo asks from the doorframe. 

“No, it’s fine. I’ll just wander around a little and find out myself.” 

Tooru smiles at him reassuringly and Kuroo nods before he makes his way to his own apartment. 

The living room is his first destination. It’s just like he imagined it to be. Spacious and comfortable. 

On the coffee table he finds a phone. After picking it up and unlocking it he scrolls through some apps until he notices it’s his phone. 

There’s a message from Kuroo with the address from his parents and their names through which Tooru reads while sitting down. He pockets the phone and lets his gaze wander around the room. Photographs of him and probably friends, some with Kuroo and Bokuto and one that seems like a family picture. 

He gets up and wanders over to the picture, taking it off the shelve to have a better look. 

It’s probably not that old. Maybe four years? An older woman and man are standing by his side, both having their arms around him. His mother, presumably, wears a gentle smile and Tooru can see that she is a gentle being altogether. His probably father is glowing with pride and only now he notices he’s holding the work contract from Tokyo University. Tooru huffs a laugh that melts into sadness instantly. 

They seem to be so close and he still can’t remember them. But he will for sure. 

He puts the picture back down with a damp noise and keeps wandering around. He opens every door he can find and looks into the rooms, desperately trying to trigger his memories. 

He still can’t remember living here. 

The last door he opens leads to the bedroom. Shallow light shines through the window and spreads out on the king size bed. That’s a difference to the hospital bed. 

Automatically, he skips to the dresser, opening the drawers. Engrossed in his actions, he misses the fact that he knows exactly where the things he wants are. With a hand full of clothes, he gazes lostly at the commode unable to remember living here, but knowing exactly where his things are. 

He slams the drawers shut as if the sound could chase away his confused feelings and makes his was to take a hot, calming shower. 

After soothing his muscles and feeling a little more human, he finds everything he wants on an instant and it confuses the hell out of him as he has no memory of having been here before. 

As he lies in bed after buying a train ticket to Sendai, where he seems to have grown up, he feels like the bed is too spacious for him alone. This night will be a game of tossing and turning. 

 

Tooru wakes up to the shrill noises of his alarm. Still rubbing his eyes, he gets up to finish himself before leaving. He doesn’t notice the alarm is still ringing until he has a toothbrush in his mouth. Groaning, he goes back and turns it off, maybe a little too harsh.

Blinded by the sun he stumbles back into his room. The sun is much too bright for his taste right now, so he shuts the blinds. 

He realizes he’s not a morning person. Not at all. 

When he’s finally done and looking like a functional human, he has a message from Kuroo, informing him that his parents know about his visit and that he’s invited to stay longer than one day. So he throws some clothes and toiletries into a duffle back. 

A glance to the clock tells him that he may be a little late, he rushes to the door, but doesn’t miss to grab the worn book about physics on his way, and down the hallway, into the elevator, just to run down the streets to the right train station. Of course his train has a ten minute delay and he wasn’t supposed to hurry that much. He didn’t even get to put contacts in and now has his glasses on instead. 

Groaning, he flops down onto one of the uncomfortable iron benches. 

He remembered the way here. Almost as if hypnotized, he found his way and went right. Maybe the memories of his flat will be back soon. It’s his home after all.

He shoots a text to Kuroo, telling him that he’s on his way now and that he shouldn’t worry. 

Kuroo: i know i heard you falling down the stairs lol

Cursing his best friend he pockets the phone and rummages through the others in his jacket he gladly didn’t forget to put on. His fingers touch a box and he pulls it out. Cigarettes.

Does he smoke? 

Right now, he doesn’t have the urge to, so putting them back into his pocket seems like the best decision. 

The jacket has a weird smell. It’s the same scent his other clothes have, but before he can mind it any longer, the train arrives and he gets in. 

Fortunately, he finds an empty booth.

He sits down and starts reading his book, but the more he reads, the more he remembers and after another few pages he remembers everything again. He also starts to faintly remember what he’s currently teaching his classes. The longer he thinks about the university, the more things come back into his head. Names of students, teachers and also to never eat anything Sasaki-san brought with her. 

Content to be able to teach again soon, he leans into the seat, the book still resting on his lap.

With droopy eyes he gazes out of the window, head supported by his hand. He watches a single bird fly beside the train. Isn’t it impossible for the bird to always fly in the constant speed beside the train? He’s not a biologist, but physically seen it is.

The bird leashes out for a moment, makes a curve and flies through the shut window. It’s in the booth, screaming and flapping around and Tooru shuts his eyes cursing. His raging heartbeat drowns out the crying of the bird. 

Suddenly, there’s silence and the bird is gone. It’s almost as if he’s never been here. Frantically his eyes search through the cabin, looking for a trace of the bird. Tooru examines the window. It’s shut and completely leakproof. There’s no way for a bird to get in. 

Maybe he’s just tired. 

He leans back and closes his eyes, trying to get his heart rate to slow down. 

In his mind he counts to ten until he hears the door being slid open.

His eyes fly open as the stranger from yesterday gets in and sits down across of him.  
Up close he’s even more beautiful. He’s not wearing a jacket over the shirt and for a moment Tooru is afraid he’s freezing. He’s staring at the perfectly toned skin and is aware of it. 

When he finally catches his composure again, he looks him in the face. The stranger is also staring at him, but with an amused smirk.

“Hello there, nice to see you again” 

His smirk grows even wider, if that’s even possible. 

For no real reason, Tooru’s heart starts to speed up again and heat floods through his body. Irregular breaths leave his mouth and he has no idea what this guy is doing to him. 

“Iwaizumi Hajime, now, who are you? Are you stalking me?” Iwaizumi asks with a raised eyebrow. 

“Oikawa Tooru and hell, no! I was here first! If someone is stalking someone, it’s you!” he sputters. Something isn’t right with Iwaizumi. Tooru can’t explain it but it feels like he already knows him. 

“Do we know each other?” 

“Oh yes. That’s why I just introduced myself to you,” he answers with a sarcastic look. 

Tooru wants to tell him he has amnesia and it’s a justified question, but telling a stranger that much about himself would be weird. So he keeps tight. Instead Iwaizumi takes the word. 

“Where are you going? Running away?” 

He’s looking at the duffle bag beside Tooru with a questioning look. 

“No, I’m just visiting my parents. What about you?” 

Iwaizumi shrugs, “Just needed some time to myself.” 

“So you jump onto a train and befriend strangers? That’s not really time for oneself, is it?” he asks suspiciously. 

Iwaizumi laughs and Tooru is enraptured by the way his eyes catch the sun light, by the way his face scrunches up, letting the freckles dance across his skin. 

“If they are pretty, yes,” is his completely sober answer and Tooru feels like fainting. 

“Well, Iwa-chan, it takes more than a compliment to woo me. You gotta put more effort into this,” he says with a, hopefully, sly smile. 

Desperately he clings to his composure even though he feels like screaming. 

Iwaizumi gets a pen from his pocket and takes the book on Tooru’s lap. Swift fingers open it to the first page and scribbles something in. Surprise has sown Tooru’s mouth shut and he’s unable to stop Iwaizumi. 

“I guess if you’re up for more you need to text me,” he smiles, giving Tooru the book back. Before the latter can even protest, Iwaizumi is on his way. 

“That’s my stop, see you,” he shouts back over his shoulder and Tooru is left alone and feels like a truck has hit him. 

He opens the book to the same page Iwaizumi did and traces the digits with his fingers. 

The number is saved as soon as he manages to decipher the black scratches and he shoots him a text:

You owe me a new physics book. 

 

Tooru opens his eyes again, just to see that the next stop is his.

The sleep he had the last two hours were better than the whole night he just had.

Drowsily, he rubs his eyes. The sun is still too bright.

Maybe it’s wrong to say that he’s not a morning person. Maybe he’s just a not an awake person at all.

The train drives into the right station and Tooru gets his stuff and jumps out of the train. 

While stretching his long arms he waits for the satisfying cracks his joints do and he repeats the same procedure with his neck. 

People hugging each other as a welcome are all around him and he wonders if his parents will pick him up. But Kuroo didn’t mention that, so he guesses not and takes off to find a taxi.

The sun shines onto his back, giving him an uncomfortable feeling of heat on one specific area. After trying to shrug it off, he notices it doesn’t work. Mentally punching himself for trying to shrug the sun off, he knocks onto the window of a taxi. 

“Are you free?” 

The only answer he gets is a deep growl and nod from an old man who seems to be unable to ever get out of that taxi ever again. He pushes one of the buttons on the dashboard and the trunk opens up. 

Tooru throws the duffle bag in and gets into the taxi, reading the address of his home to the stranger. 

His eyes follow the small car character on the navi, showing a ride of approximately ten minutes. 

Rolling the windows down, Tooru stretches his arm out of it, feeling the wind slip through his fingers. He stares at the moving scenery as if it is the first time he has been here. 

Which he knows isn’t true. But it feels like it and he can’t get rid of it. 

Tooru just stares and stares, trying to remember the streets from his childhood in vain. Before he even gets the chance to grasp some of his buried memories, the taxi stops. 

“ ¥ 2,070 .” 

It's mumbled and Tooru doesn’t get what he wants at first, but then realizes he’s in a taxi and gets the money he just pushed into his pockets and hands it over. He even graces the man with a tip, whyever. 

The trunk springs open again and Tooru bids his goodbye as polite as possible, gets the duffle bag and watches the taxi drive away. 

Closely, he gazes at the house numbers to find the right one. Eventually, after a while of looking like an exposed puppy, he finds the right one and strides to the front door. 

Some walls are clad in dark wood as contrast to the white. It has a western touch, but typical japanese flourishes. 

With every step he comes closer, he feels a little warmer and safer. But the memories stay stolen.

Before he can even announce his arrival, the door is shoved open and a woman who only reaches his sternum glowers at him. 

“My child!” she screams and he’s caged between her arms, the duffle bag falling to the ground with a thump.

Even though having no recognition of the woman, he hugs her back as tight as he can. 

She pulls back and takes his hand, already pulling him inside while a string of words leaves her mouth. He manages to grab the bag before he’s being dragged into the house.  
“I already prepared your room. You’ve got to be hungry, I cooked a little with the help of your sister. Aren’t you cold? How are you by the way?” 

In the, probably living room, she finally comes to a halt, her eyes still glowing with glee and Tooru can only say one thing: 

“I have a sister?”

Her face falters immediately. She seems a lot older now, as if this small question managed to give her even more wrinkles. Sanding on her tiptoes, she lays a hand onto his cheek. 

“Oh dear, you don’t remember. I’m sorry for being so excited. Yes, you have an older sister. And a nephew! They will come over soon.”

Great. Even more people he knows he loves, but can’t recognize. The nodding of his head is automatic. 

“Come on, sit down. I’ll show you a few pictures.” 

Again, she takes him by the hand and leads him away. Without thinking about it, he tightens the grip on his mother's hand. The gentle smile on her face is everything he wanted. In the dining room it’s already smelling delicious and the scent does remind him of home. Even though he still doesn’t know if this is really home. 

“Your sister, Aiko, just left to pick your nephew, Takeru, up from school,” his mother elaborates after he sat down. Noisily she rummages through the commode to his left before coming back with an armful of photo albums. 

It dawns on him that he can’t escape before looking through all of them. 

Paging through the first one, he asks where his father is. She tells him he’s still at work and will be back in the evening. 

After the third album he asks his mother about something he noticed the whole time. 

“Who is the boy that’s always beside me?” 

For a moment, his mother looks petrified but then she starts to stutter an answer out. 

“He was your best friend when you were younger. But he and his family moved away. You never saw each other again. It’s really sad.”

Tooru nods in understanding, and yes, he can remember strolling around outside the whole day with the kid whose name he has forgotten. 

Shortly before they reach the fifth album, the door opens again and Tooru thinks he has never been more happy to see his sister. 

But at first a teenager enters the room greeting his grandmother. When his mother mentioned a nephew, he imagined a child, and not a teenager. 

“Hey uncle. Good to see you again. How are you feeling?” 

Typical teenager manners. Just a clasp on the shoulder, that almost causes Tooru to fall from his chair, and a nonchalant greeting. 

“Besides having a shoulder trauma now, I’m good,” he answers while rubbing his shoulder.  
“Where is my little brother who doesn’t know how to drive a car?” his, probably, sister storms into the room, awkwardly hugging him. 

A chair scrapes over the floor and she sits down beside him, staring as if he needs to tell her something. But all of a sudden, she claps her hands in front of his face. Now he really nearly fell off the chair. 

“What the hell was that?” he screams at her out of breath, totally not startled. 

“You should remember everything now,” she answers with a sly smile.

“That helps when you have a hiccup and not amnesia, you douche,” he says exasperatedly, but his sister just keeps grinning.

Tooru can’t believe he’s related to someone like her. It’s like the time she sat him into a cardboard box with rockets all around it. Reason: I thought you wanted to meet aliens. 

Oh god, he remembers his sister. His horrible sister whom he loves with all of his heart. Tooru can’t bring himself to say anything, so he just keeps gaping at her like a fish.

“I told you I could get him to remember, you owe me, Mum.” 

Tooru just hugs her. Maybe because he doesn’t want to ruin the moment by punching her.

“That wasn’t necessary. Why do you always have to bother your brother?” his mother says, barely keeping a laugh off her lips.

Those words. Tooru has heard them a thousand times already. Also after the rocket incident. His mother who always tried to stand by his side, even though not being able to contain her amusement. She always stood beside his stern father, who always thought they should be left to their own devices. 

“Oh Mum, I’m so sorry for forgetting you,” he says before hugging her. It’s warm and so welcoming and so familiar. 

“It’s OK, but don’t you dare ever go forgetting me again, young man.” 

Tooru doesn’t want to make this threat come true. 

“Took you quite a while to recognize your family. I understand why you have forgotten my mum, that was probably trauma suppressing, but your own mother?”

Takeru says in the typical bored teenager tone and Tooru misses when he was still a child. Even though he himself is to blame when it comes to Takeru’s sassy being. He was a good teacher after all. Maybe too good, even.

He remembers his nephew. They always played volleyball together. Tooru played volleyball. 

He feels dizzy and wanks back over to his seat, flopping down. 

“Are you OK, honey?” 

It’s his mother’s worried tone that brings him back to the earth again. Remembering so much in such a short time is taking its toll on his head. But he smiles at her, nodding, because this is a reason to smile. 

As if everyone understands, they join him.

Tooru is just glad to remember his gorgeous family. 

 

By 3am, after meeting his father again, he’s in his old room. The meeting with his father wasn’t as spectacular as the others. His father has always been awkward with feelings. Tooru got a half hug and a “good that you’re back” and can’t complain. But exactly that behaviour managed to trigger the memories. 

He had this room till he moved out and it feels good to be here again. He has always loved visiting his family. Sleep won’t come, though. 

There are just too much blank spaces in his memory and also the question why it took him so long to remember his family occupies his mind. 

Not thinking that this will be over soon, he gets up and makes himself a cup of tea and sits on the terrace with it. 

It’s OK with piyama pants and a hoodie. The hot cup in his hands may also make it better. 

He already drunk a quarter of it when the door slides open and his sister sits down next to him. Her warmth embraces him like arms and he relaxes into it.

“You haven’t changed,” she whispers.

“Neither have you.” 

Whenever Tooru wasn’t able to sleep, he did this. Until his sister accidentally caught on to it. She then started to join her brother, even though she herself was so tired, she could have slept with open eyes. But just because she didn’t want her brother to be lonely, she stayed awake. 

Her head is pillowed on Tooru’s shoulder and as it seem, her will to stay awake isn’t stronger than her tiredness. 

That’s how they bonded. The times this happened where the only ones where they finally had time for each other in between the hustle of life. Both of them too busy to even recognize the other during the day. 

“We should get in, you’re tired.” 

“I’m not.” 

Sometimes his sister is like a child. So he treats her like one. He puts the cup on the table, he will just put it away when he wakes up, and pulls his sister up, who is way easier to drag around than he thought. 

Hushed whispers of complainments are exchanged and Tooru is sure she didn’t always swear that much. Keeping their voices down, they bicker and push and pull, but Tooru has already brought her inside. Realizing her defeat, she gets up and goes to her room again. But only after ruffling his hair. Which she has been doing since he had hair. 

“Good night, baby brother,” she mumbles before entering her own room. 

“I’m 32 for fuck’s sake!” he scream whispers after her only to hear her familiar snickering. The corners of his mouth get pulled up at their own and he shakes his head. 

He wakes up to the sound of something falling on the ground. Most likely a volleyball sized marble.

He sits up in the bed, looking around for the source of it, but it’s too dark to even see the palm of his hand. 

Another rumble echoes through the room. Like the low groaning of a bear.

Tooru gets more anxious with every second he sits in the dark room. Frantically, he wheezes his head around, trying to see anything.

Until the room is illuminated in a shallow red light that’s shining through the windows.

A hunched shadow is luring in the farest corner of his room. Faintly he can recognize the limbs, the damp eyes and the ravenous mouth. 

He wants to scream, but it’s as if his vocal cords have been cut by the monstrosity in the corner. 

Slowly sounds start to build up. The crashing noise of metal against metal, screams and the tangled talking of people. 

This isn’t real, this isn’t real.

Tooru’s head is a battlefield. 

The creature only breathes heavily, not moving a single muscle. He wants to run away, but his feet won’t move, as if they don’t belong to him anymore. His whole body doesn’t belong to him anymore. 

The distance between him and the hidden creature gets smaller with every second and Tooru doesn’t comprehend why he can’t see it moving until he understands. 

Instead of the creature coming closer, the room starts to narrow. The walls come closer and the ceiling threatens to fall down. The creature is pushed nearer and nearer. 

It opens his mouth, showing off rows and rows of ravenous teeth that could rip a bowling ball apart with one snap. 

Wider and wider it opens its jaw, saliva dripping from all its canines. 

Tooru screws his eyes shut. He still hears the heavy breathing of the creature and feels it on his neck. His whole body is trembling as he sits there waiting for the end. But then there’s silence. 

When he opens his eyes again, the sun is shining into his face, causing him to squint. 

More exhausted than he was before sleeping, he sits up in his old bed. Precisely he examines himself, looking for wounds that could have been caused by a wolf-bear hybrid. As expected, he finds none. 

He breathes out and leans back. A shallow gaze to the clock tells him it’s still too early to be actually awake. Maybe just a little more. 

So he tries and tries and tries to sleep, to no avail. Annoyed and absolutely tired he stomps into the bathroom, getting ready for the already too long day. 

At first the bird and now the dream. Did someone drug him?

Tooru tries to shake it off. Tries to call it an aftershock from the car crash. Yes, that’s what it is. 

Feeling a little more human than before, he sits down at the table with a cup of coffee, waiting for the rest to wake up. 

 

The days pass peacefully. He talks a lot to his family and they have stupidly domestic dinners every day. Tooru isn’t used to all of this anymore. 

It’s peaceful, until he gets a message from Ushijima.

Ushiwaka: Please don’t forget your meeting with the psychologist tomorrow. -Ushijima.

He texts like an old man. Writing his name behind the message as if Tooru doesn’t have his number saved. 

But he almost forgot about the appointment. Seems like he has to leave today. He’s already sure that his sister will insist on driving him to the train station. 

“I will leave today. I’ve got something to do tomorrow.” 

He informs them without looking up from his screen, back to being engrossed in the article about how to use superheroes in physics classes. 

“Didn’t you know that earlier? I swear to god, you would lose your head, wouldn’t it be screwed onto your shoulders,” his mother tsks. 

“I’ll drive you, when do you want to go?”

As expected. 

“I don’t know. I need to look it up at first.”

Tooru takes a sip of his coffee. His vacation with his family isn’t improving his constantly growing coffee consumption. 

Hours later he finally collapses into his bed, because travelling is so exhausting. He just manages to set his alarm before passing out. 

Again, he wakes up to the ugly sound coming out of his phone. 

Never in his life would he set an appointment at such ungodly hours, but Ushijima lives in another world. 

Tooru tries to unwind himself out of the blanket cocoon and almost crashes to the ground. 

After stumbling through his flat as if in a daze, he finally manages to put his shoes on and get out. 

It may be that waking up in the morning is the worst thing ever, but nothing is better than fresh morning air. 

His glasses steam up and Tooru curses himself for not being able to buy enough contacts. 

Marching on, he searches for the practice of the psychologist. It’s in a dark alley and he can’t really believe it’s the right building. But signs normally don’t lie. So he gets in and is immediately greeted by the smell of incense. If he had eaten anything before, it would be spread on the carpet by now. 

A woman with long gray hair falling to her breasts approaches him and Tooru questions how many bird nests must be hidden in her hair. 

Huge and stupidly thick Harry Potter glasses sit on her nose, so her blue eyes seem even more urgent. 

“You must be Oikawa Tooru, it’s nice to meet you.” 

She speaks slowly with a smokey voice, but she seems like such a nice lady, Tooru can’t bring himself to go, even though he really wants to. 

He just nods and smiles at her. 

“Come on, get in. I will make you a tea.”

She walks into a room and Tooru follows. It seems to be her office.Firstly, because it smells even more like incense here and secondly,because there are books spread everywhere and on the floor are approximately a dozen differently patterned carpets. Dimmed orange light colors everything it touches in a confusingly soothing hue.

He takes a seat on the green sofa that seems to be out of another timeline. She emerges back into the room through a fringe curtain, two steaming mugs in her hand. 

Tooru thankingly takes one and she sits down beside him, still smiling. 

But then she drops it and starts speaking with a glass-clear voice. 

“You have amnesia. This can cause a few mental health issues. You may experience anxiety or depression. It varies from person to person. It can be severe. Have you ever experienced something like that?” 

He thinks a few minutes about it, trying the tea he was given and it’s unexpectedly good. 

“I don’t think so. At least I can’t remember.” 

She talks him through the basic things. What it feels like, what he can do against it, how people around him can help him, yaddah, yaddah. 

But then she asks something that catches him off guard. 

“Have you experienced something strange in the last few days?”

Actually, he has. Can he trust her? What if she works for the state and they are just trying to manipulate him? 

God, what is he thinking? 

“Yeah, I did,” Tooru stumbles over the syllables as words tumble out of his mouth, telling her about the bird and the monster. 

She nods affirmative as she considers her next words. Before speaking, she pushes her glasses up and Tooru thinks the silence is pushing him into the ground.

“As I thought. You experience hallucinations. But as you describe them, they are very weak. It won’t take long till they are gone.”

Her reassuring smile really is something and Tooru already feels better. It wasn’t stupid to come here at all. He likes the woman’s odd additude. 

They talk for some more. She wants to know everything about Tooru. At least as much as he himself knows. Also, she requests him to write his hallucinations down and somehow it suddenly feels weird to talk with her. 

“Do you want me to help you?” 

It’s phrased like a question, but Tooru can clearly hear the in between words. Even if you don’t want to, I will help you. My way. 

He shuffles on his chair, her whole character suddenly shifts to scary. At least Tooru is scared. What if she wants to sell that information to the state? He will never write his experiences down. 

She finally lets him go, saying they will meet up at the same time in two weeks.

Tooru won’t come back for sure. 

 

Papers, pens and lots of other office stuff is scattered on his desk. It’s his first lesson tomorrow and oh God, why does he have six different classes? Is that even allowed? 

At least he just has one of them in the morning. But therefore at 8am. He also got an email informing him that he should please be in the principal's office by 7. Sadism.

His fingers flip through the pages of his notebook, hoping to find any trace of where he left off. He isn’t very fond of notes as it seems. The notebook is empty except for a few alien doodles. 

Loud music is booming through his apartment because he actually remembered that he likes music. Currently he’s trying to listen through his whole playlist, reasoning that he can grasp what his taste in music is like that. Until now he noticed that he likes everything. There’s even a german metal band on his playlist. 

His phone vibrates so hard, it threatens to fall off the ledge. Tooru picks it up and it’s a new message from Iwaizumi. He smiles at the familiar name. 

The past days they texted a lot and Tooru really starves to see him again. 

Iwaizumi: U free 2morrow??

Tooru noticed he texts worse than some of his students. And that’s already bad. 

Of course he answers with a yes, trying to play it casual, and they make up the details. 

By then, the prep stuff for his class is long forgotten and he’s leaned back in his swivel chair, smiling at his phone like a maniac. 

Until the music goes off all of a sudden and his phone goes black. 

Startled he looks up as if to see the black creature crouching above him. But then he hears annoyed knocking on his door and his heart almost falls apart. 

His eyes wander from left to right like bullets until he decides to man up and go looking. 

On wobbly feet he wanders over to the door, hand already on the handle. Damn this building for not having peepholes. 

Trembling, he grabs one of the umbrellas to his right to arm himself with and opens the door. It swings open to reveal Kuroo and Kozume. The door crashes against the wall and a bone shaking sound echoes through the hallway. 

It swings back again and Kozume stops it with his foot, expression the same surprised one Kuroo has. 

Tooru can see Kuroo’s smile drop at the sight of him armed with an umbrella, ready to crash it into a head. 

“Dude, it’s just us,” Kuroo says with so much hesitation, Tooru isn’t used to. 

He finally exhales and puts the umbrella back. Opening the door wider and stepping back in should be enough of an invitation. 

He’s already on the couch, burying his head in his hands when he hears whispering from the hallway. Too bad his hearing is as good as his sight. 

The door falls into the frame and Tooru gets up to check on his phone. His heart is pulsating as if he missed the last step by walking down the stairs. 

Did he imagine what happened?

He picks it up and is still greeted with the black screen. His thoughts are twisting and turning to find an answer to it, but they only knot themselves together into conspiracy theories. 

He pushes the home button repeatedly, cursing when still nothing works.

“You don’t have to try. I hacked it.” 

It’s Kozume’s monotonous voice that breaks the spell. 

“Why the hell would you do that?” 

He shrugs. 

“We needed to get your attention. Your music was too loud, so I hacked your phone to turn it off. Like that you were able to hear the knocking.” 

Tooru isn’t really satisfied with that answer. After all that means he can always hack his phone whenever he wants. And his sober way of informing him about it doesn’t add any sincerity. 

“Don’t worry. I do that only in cases of an emergency,” he says as if knowing what Tooru is thinking. He’s typing rapidly on his phone and Tooru’s phone comes back to life in his hand.

“What do you even want here?” 

Somehow, Kuroo managed to get behind Tooru and is now dropping an arm onto his shoulders.

“I’ve known you for long enough to know that you are currently beating yourself up over tomorrow. So we came to help you relax a little.” 

Kuroo stares knowingly at his desk with a raised eyebrow, as if to say “Told you so”. Tooru already wants to decline everything Kuroo just said, wouldn’t it be for the fact that he’s right. So he nods and is then pushed over to the couch beside Kozume. 

“I'll cook for us now.” Kuroo informs them by stemming his hands on his hips like the mother hen he is. 

“I don’t think you can do that. I have literally nothing at home.” 

“Didn’t I just tell you I know you? That’s why we went grocery shopping before coming,” he answers with a sly smile and wanders back into the hallway to get a white bag with probably ingredients. 

Sometimes it’s good to have a friend who’s a professional chef. Most of all when he has Kuroo’s personality. 

“So, how was your meeting with the soul plumper?” he screams from the kitchen. His words almost unheard by the running water in the background as he washes vegetables. 

Tooru rolls his eyes, unaware of the fact that Kuroo can’t even see him. 

“It was OK. Better than expected. But I won’t go there again.”

For a moment there’s only the sound of running water until Kozume seems to have had enough. 

“Why is that so?” he asks cautiously, as if not to scare Tooru away. 

“I’m having a bad feeling about her. She’s not to be trusted. I don’t want to give her too much information.” He speaks fast and it must sound mad, judging by the way Kozume turns around and searching for Kuroo’s eyes. 

“It doesn’t matter, I’m fine after all,” he tries to reassure his friends. 

Kozume doesn’t look really reassured. Kuroo is probably pouting in the kitchen without anybody seen. 

“Anyways, do you know something about my students? Do I ever tell you about them?” 

After a few seconds of either hesitation or considering, Kozume answers. 

“Yeah. Sometimes you tell us about them. At least a few of them. Most of the time you tell stories about a guy that always has perfect scores, but is a total fuck up otherwise.” 

Kozume looks totally fond and Tooru remembers faintly. Remembers the time where he wanted to build rockets with his class. It was a hassle. He had to bribe Maeve, a chemistry professor, to give him oxygen and liquid hydrogen. And his fuck up did what fuck ups do and launched his rocket into the gym. Tooru had to pay for it and wasn’t allowed to do experiments for half a year. Even now he still has to ask for permission. 

As expected, the dinner was great. They indulge themselves in memories and Tooru heard a lot more stories he suddenly was able to vividly remember. 

When Kuroo cooks, Tooru is always a little jealous of Kozume. He gets to eat his stuff everyday. And Tooru has to get amnesia before getting some. 

Over the past days, Tooru realized he loves being in the company of people. How did he not get lonely before?

This night, it takes Tooru a lot of effort to fall asleep. And when he does, he wished he never had. 

He wakes up on a cold concrete floor, his face pressed against it. Bleakness is embracing him like an old friend and he shudder. 

Unable to really hold his eyes open, he sits up and tries to identify his environment.

Graffiti is sprayed onto the walls around him, trying to conceal the cracks that have built up there over the years. 

A dizzy feeling is layered spreading through his body as soon as he moves and he thinks he will vomit. Blurry images are all his eyes take in anymore, but when he has a clear picture again, he’s able to see the window without glass. Planks are nailed to it and Tooru has no idea where he is. 

Pressing his knees as close as he can to his body helps him feel saver, because no he realized he’s not alone. There are more of his kind. Passed out people, some lying in their own vomit, some half awake, moaning while luring in their stage between dead and alive. 

Through the planks he can see that it’s pitch black outside. Too afraid to move he just whiles there between them, sometimes watching new people arrive. They search for a spot and then they do whatever the hell they want, drink, take ecstacy, crack, heroin or cannabis and the realization of where he is hits him like a stroke. Like a scared animal he holds his breath and doesn’t dare move a muscle.

But then a silver lining comes crashing through the entrance where the door is already lost. Iwaizumi searches the rooms frantically until he spots Tooru. Immediately, he comes running to him. 

As soon as he reached him he kneels down in front of Tooru, noticing he’s trembling and laying his jacket over his shoulders. 

It’s a sweet gesture, but doesn’t help the fright he’s feeling. 

“Finally, you have no idea how long I’ve been searching for you.”

Tooru isn’t fond of the unconcealed worry in his voice and crows out an apology that makes it obvious that he’s drunk as a prick. For that he excuses too, but Iwaizumi just tells him to shut up with a stern look Tooru knows is meant to be reassuring. 

Being this drunk has it’s advantages. Like that he gets carried by Iwaizumi. As they step out into the night again Tooru wakes up. 

No idea what this dreams mean and why he has them, he stares at the ceiling as if the answers to his questions are written onto it. 

Before going to his class, Tooru stops at a coffee stop. Just because his coffee doesn’t taste as good as the one from the shop by far. Maybe it’s imagination, but he couldn’t care less. 

It always feels like he is moving in slow mo, as if his brain is lagging in the morning. How do people get up and are immediately woke? He needs two liters of caffeine first.

With a steaming warm cup in his hand and headphones in, he makes his way to the university. Thank god he only has one morning class the whole week. 

Remembrances flash in his head while walking through the same park everyday on his way to work. But normally it isn’t as extinct as now. 6 am is just too early. 

“How’s it going?” 

Tooru spins around, Iwaizumi smiles toothy at him. Oh God, he’s a morning person. 

“Why are you awake?” 

Iwaizumi seems little to not surprised by Tooru’s gruff scratchy voice and absolutely annoyed attitude. He only smiles wider. 

“Early shift just ended. I’m going home.” 

Tooru thinks he should do night classes in the space of 10 pm to 6 am. That’s his time. Some students would probably like it. 

He nods in approval. “Where do you even work?” 

They fall into step and Tooru is sure this is not the way Iwaizumi would have used if they hadn’t met. It swells his heart a little. 

“I work at the hospital. I’m a surgeon.” 

That’s not what Tooru expected, but he sure doesn’t have anything against it. 

“Aren’t you too young for that?” 

Iwaizumi laughs as if Tooru just asked him what a surgeon is. Then he shrugs a little abashed. 

“I’ve always been good at what I’m doing.”

They are already near the university and Tooru knows they have to part again. In his head he tries to find a way to ask him out, as they should finally go on a date together. And then move in. 

Dear God, he’s deeply into this. 

Iwaizumi wishes him a nice day and promises to buy him a coffee for his next morning class and Tooru is just a lovesick puppy that watches him walk away in agony. 

The halls of the university smell like ancient stones and the cold air reboots his system. Not as good as coffee, but still.

With clacking steps he makes his way to the principal's office. 

Next to no people are in the hallways, besides a few stray students that are already studying for whatever and others hasting through the corridors. 

The clanking of shoes on the marble floor and the hushed whispers are so familiar to him. 

Finally, he’s at the office. Somehow, he didn’t forget the way to it. 

He’s being hasty greeted with a shallow “Good morning, come in”. Seems like someone’s as fond of mornings as he himself. 

After taking a seat, the small lecture starts. 

“We are really glad to have you back again. I hope you are doing well. You still know everything about your classes? The schedule?” 

Tooru nods and his boss looks at the watch on his wrist while desperately combing through his hair. The man needs a break. Tooru can recommend a car crash with amnesia.

“Good, good. If you have any questions you can always talk to your colleagues, of course.” 

“But not to me, as I’m too busy.” Tooru finishes the sentence in his head. 

“You need anything else?” 

The principal taps his foot impatiently and even if Tooru had anything else, he probably wouldn’t say it. He doesn’t want to waste his precious time.

With a shaking of his head the lecture is ended and after a curt “Goodbye and good luck” he’s being almost pushed out of the door. 

He knows there’s a teachers’ lounge nearby, so that’s his new destination. The teachers’ lounge and a new cup of coffee. 

A few overly zealous profs are already in there, going through there next lecture. At first no one notices him, everyone too engrossed in whatever they are doing. 

Until Mutsumi, a history professor, catches sight of him and starts forcing Tooru into a conversation before he can even get his coffee. She standing directly between him and the coffee machine and he wants to cry.

“I’m so sorry for what happened to you. I hope the amnesia isn’t too bad. How is it to have amnesia anyways? Did it hurt? What did you know when you woke up? Is your memory recovered again? What does your family say to all of this? And did you forget everything about physics?” 

She looks up to him with her grey eyes wide like saucers. She is the perfect history professor as she can’t stop talking even if her life depended on it. The whole world could fall silent, she would be talking. Tooru does know she is very nice, but it’s way too early and right now he just wants to crack her neck.

“Answers to your questions: Weird, yes, nothing, a little, again nothing, no. Now please, let me get coffee.” 

She just stares at him with her mouth ajar. Tooru really wants to tell her to shut it, because flies could get in otherwise. 

Finally, she turns around and disappears in a group of professors. He will regret snapping at her later. Right now, coffee is his priority. 

He slouches over and grabs the biggest cup he can find. 

It takes only three sips before someone else approaches him. 

It’s one of the chemistry professors. Tooru does like her. He would even call her his friend. Being in the teacher’s lounge is more bearable with her. 

“Oh god, you are finally back. I was going crazy already.” 

He laughs at her desperate expression and effort to keep her voice down. 

“I wasn’t gone for that long. And I bet Mutsumi kept you great company.” 

Her eyes are just slits of pure anger at the comment, but in the next she’s laughing again.

Maeve is a little different. It could be because she is actually from America. Tooru likes to think of her as a devil in disguise. The key answers to her tests are always perverse. Tooru also has never seen her without her white lab coat. 

For a moment she stares at the clock until she speaks completely sober again. “I think I had a class half an hour ago. I should go.” 

And then she’s out of the door again with a higher speed than necessary. She’s always halfway running, but in her case that’s something good. You should be fast on your feet when you blow something up every two weeks. 

She reminds him of Kuroo. 

Now Tooru looks at the clock. His class only begins in fifteen minutes, but staying here could get him into another conversation, so he leaps off to the lecture hall. 

From the corner of his eye he spots another professor coming his way. 

His speed matches Maeve’s now and the normally three minute walk suddenly only takes one and a half. 

Two of his students are already waiting in front of the huge wooden door, reading through their notes as if he would already let them take a surprise test. He’s not a monster.

Walking straight to one of them, he holds out his cup of coffee to the girl. “Hold.”

She squeezes her folder under her arm and immediately takes the cup while Tooru unlocks the door. 

Stepping to the lectern, he allows his hands to run over the smooth wood and the smell of the hall hits him. 

It’s good to be here again. 

The two students come in with the girl putting the coffee onto the teacher’s desk. She offers him a small smile which Tooru reciprocates. 

He uses the time to sort his papers again and go through his notes. With every passing minute more and more students start to fill in the hall. Of course the volume steadily increases too. 

The gong washes out every noise and suddenly there is a deathly silence in the hall. 

Dozens of eyes are staring at him expectedly and Tooru isn’t sure what they want. So he just stays quiet too. 

Then finally, the boy Tooru always describes as fuck up raises his voice and for the first time ever, he’s glad about it. 

“They told us what happened, how are you, Oikawa-san?”

He smiles at them and hopes they didn’t worry too much. 

“I’m fine. Thanks for asking, but let's get back to physics.” 

He cracks a smile and claps in his hands, the sound echoing through the hall. Some of his students twitch in surprise, even though they should be used to it by now. 

Tooru dives headfirst into physics again and even hears some of them whisper things along the lines “It’s like he has never been gone”.

The students are currently taking a trainings test, so Tooru corrects over some papers he has gotten today. 

But then the volume increases again. Everyone is talking in a jumble. The talking gets under his skin, speeding up his heart. beat. It causes a restlessness inside of him he can’t explain. It’s getting louder and louder until he snaps. 

Jumping to his feet, he slaps onto the desk with his palms while screaming “Silence”. Nearly everyone jerks back and within a second, all heads are turned to him.

A needle falling to the ground could be heard in that moment. As if everyone is holding their breath. 

The fuck up speaks up again. 

“No one has said anything.” 

All the heads start bobbing up and down and Tooru isn’t sure what to believe right now. 

He crashes into the chair and just gestures for them to keep going. For the rest of the class he just stares at the clock which is staring right back. 

When the gong announces the end of the class, Tooru is still sitting there, not moving a single muscle. 

Something is entirely wrong with him. 

Every third night he has dreams like the one at his parents’ house and every time this happens, it feels real all over again. 

Maybe he should go to the psychologist again. But on the other hand he still isn’t sure for whom she works. Tooru won’t tell her everything just so she can sell the information. 

He finally packs his stuff and heads home. His next class is only at 3 pm. 

With the feeling of thousands of eyes on him, he leaves only to come back again later. 

The first thing he does at home is getting the aluminium foil. With medical precision he tapes it onto his windows.

If he can’t see them, they shouldn’t see him either. 

He texts Iwaizumi throughout the whole day, with every message contemplating telling him about his weird occasions, his feeling of being stalked. 

Eventually he decides against it and chooses not to tell a single soul.

 

For the past few days he has felt restless as if there are streets of ants under his skin. Sitting still for even a minute is too much. Suddenly classes are horrible again. And he’d thought going to college as a student sucks. 

A knock on the door jerks him into the present again, nearly causing him to shove the radio off the table. 

He sprints to the door and presses his back against it. His heart is speeding up and his breathing gets shallow as if this weren’t just two meters to run.

“Who is there?” 

He desperately tries to layer the fear with authority. 

A sigh from the other door. Tooru clutches the screwdriver in his hand hard enough for his knuckles to turn white. 

“Akaashi Keiji.” 

Nearly taking the weapon down, Tooru almost believes him, but then again, they want him to believe it. 

“How do I know it’s really you?” 

There’s a moment of hesitation before he speaks again. Tooru already thought he just left again. 

“Tell me something only Akaashi can know.” 

If this is a doppelgänger, Tooru doesn’t know what he should do and how they found him. 

Another sigh. 

“Back in our first year in college we kissed, because I was unsure about whether I love men or not, so I concluded kissing the prettiest boy would clear things up and we never told anyone,” a low thump hits the door and Tooru is almost sure Akaashi leaned his head against it before continuing to whisper, “please, Tooru. Open the door.” 

They have sworn to take that little secret to the grave. Someone who is not Akaashi is unable to know. 

He unlocks the door and smiles sheepishly at his friends. For a curt moment, Akaashi smiles back tiredly, but then he shoves himself through the area between Tooru and the door frame and stomps the hallway down into the living room. 

Tooru doesn’t move until the footsteps mute, only then he follows. 

“What is all of this?” 

Akaashi looks confused to the maximum, an expression Tooru has never seen on him. And he lives with Bokuto, which already brings a lot of confusion. 

But this is different. Akaashi looks worried. 

His gaze constantly wanders over the radio parts, Tooru just disassembled, spread out on the table. 

Tooru presses the screwdriver closer to his chest. 

All the lights are turned on and a few lit candles drop their wax onto everything they can reach. 

“Why is there aluminium foil taped onto your windows?” 

Akaashi aks it in a very slow and sober tone and Tooru still thinks he can cut himself on the edges of his voice. 

He just rubs his arm as an act of reassurance and glances off. 

“The sunlight was too bright, so I shut it out.” 

It’s a believable lie, Tooru tries to assure himself. Akaashi nods slowly before pointing at a wall. 

“What’s up with all of the clocks?” 

Tooru hung up dozens of clocks onto one wall, everyone for a different time zone. He doesn’t remember why he did it, but he guesses someone told him to. Papers with the names of capitals hastily scribbled onto them are pinned under every clock so he can keep track. 

Akaashi nods again. 

“I will go now, just wanted to check on you.” 

Before Tooru can say as much as “okay” Akaashi has already stormed out. 

Graveyard silence reigns his flat after the door falls into the lock. Then his phone vibrates and he already thinks it’s Akaashi again, telling him he’s sick. 

But the lit screen tells him it’s Iwaizumi. 

Iwaizumi: can i come over?

Tooru just answers with a short yes. He doesn’t think Iwaizumi will be bothered by the weird stuff in his flat. Something tells him. 

Not even five minutes of staring at the wall later, there’s another knock on the door. 

Skipping the whole ceremony he did when Akaashi knocked, he opens the door. 

They exchange some slowly spoken and hushed heys after which Iwaizumi takes place on Tooru’s couch, drinking coffee from a plastic cup. 

“What’s up with the aluminium foil?” 

“So no one can spy on me of course.” 

Iwaizumi’s expression grows more confused as he stares at the darkened windows. 

“Who is spying on you?” 

Tooru jumps up and bolts into his bedroom, taking a box out from under his bed and opens it carefully. In there is a thick photo album he takes out and carries back to Iwaizumi. 

He sits down beside him and starts paging through it. 

Tooru spent years with this album. Every article he ever found which held some strange information he either printed or cut out and glued into the book, writing a theses down too. He never showed anyone. 

Some of the pages are glued together a little. Excess glue is on the pages from hasty gluing articles on pages in dark nights.

“The State. They spy on everyone, but not everyone can see it.” 

“That’s,” Iwaizumi cuts himself off and looks through the album, “that’s very interesting, but Oikawa, they don’t.” 

“Yes they do, there are people following me, I need to warn everyone.” 

Tooru is keeping his voice low, speaking faster than he probably should. 

Iwaizumi puts his hand on his shoulder, a reassuring gesture and waits till he calmed down a little. 

“Oikawa. There are no people from the state following you. You are making things up.” 

“No, you don’t understand. They are watching. I feel so unsafe.” 

He feels like he isn’t far away from crying. He’s tired of people telling him his imagination is playing tricks on him. He knows that he’s right. 

Iwaizumi’s hand wanders from his shoulder to his cheek. 

“Okay. Would you feel safer if I moved in with you?” 

Tooru can’t hear anymore. The words are ringing in his head, slowly fading too. He shakes himself out of his trance. 

“Yes. If you are OK with that.” 

He’s stumbling over the vocals as nervousness takes a hold of him. Maybe all of this is going too fast, but holy shit he is in love. 

“You know, living with me can be exhausting. I do weird stuff.” 

All he can see is the grin on Iwaizumi’s face and feel the still longing hand on his cheek. 

“I will be fine.” 

Tooru thinks this is a good moment for a first kiss. So he goes for it and leans in. 

Iwaizumi catches him and it’s not like fireworks or a bonfire. It’s like coming back home. All domestic and vulnerable.

They take the foil off the windows afterwards.

 

“It’s 3 am. What are you doing?” 

Hajime’s gruff voice gains Tooru’s attention. His hands are sticky and soft music plays in the background as he lostly stares out of the window. 

He faces Hajime and can’t help smiling. It’s been a month since he moved in and Tooru is still surprised to see him in his flat at every time. 

“I’m baking a cake.” 

He says it as if it’s the most natural thing you do in the middle of the night. Hajime just laughs and moves up behind him. 

“What’ll it be?” 

“Lemon meringue pie.”

Hajime hums into his shoulder. Baking a cake in the middle of the night is the most effective way Tooru copes with his insomnia. In his refrigerator is always at least one cake. In bad weeks, even two. 

Right now he perfectioned the art of baking that even Kuroo can’t keep up with his. Tooru would lie if he said he wasn’t proud of that. 

Tooru cracks one of the eggs on the bowl and puts it into the dough. 

Hajime stays with him until the cake is finished. Mostly he’s sitting on the counter in all his glory while talking as prevention to not fall asleep. At 4 am the pie is done and cooled. 

Tooru cuts it and they go onto the balcony to eat it. Fresh night air passes by, sending shivers down Tooru’s spine. He always forgets how warm it gets in his flat when he bakes. 

“I haven’t told my friends about,” Tooru gestures with his finger between them, “this.” 

Hajime only hums. Probably too tired to care. 

“It’s OK. It doesn’t have to be. Actually, I like it the way it is. I’m not comfortable around other people.” 

Tooru nods. Maybe they can keep their little secret a little longer. 

Watching the cars drive by, they eat their cake in silence and go to bed afterwards and Tooru is able to sleep.

“You know what could help you? Cannabis.” 

Almost choking on the pancake Hajime put down in front of him no five minutes ago, Tooru tries to catch his breath again while staring disbelieving at his boyfriend whose currently declaring that drugs are a great getaway from nightmares and insomnia with a spatula in his hand. 

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Don’t play dumb,” Hajime points the spatula at Tooru, “you know what I just suggested. I’m sure it can help you. You also wouldn’t be that stressed anymore. And I could watch over you.” 

Tooru can’t believe what he’s hearing. It came a little unexpectedly to say the least. His eyebrows may stay melted into his hairline forever.

“And how do you think I can get drugs?” he asks around a mouthful of pancakes that are probably the best he’s ever eaten. 

The sight of a muscular back greets him when he looks back up, as Hajime tries to finally end cooking breakfast. 

“Haven’t you told me about your favorite student who always has some in his locker? By the way, it’s irresponsible to not say anything.” 

“Are you mad? I can’t ask him. Also, he’s the best student I’ve ever had. If that came to the surface it could end his career on spot.” 

The clanking of a plate hitting wood echoes through the room while Hajime sits down across of him. 

“You are his professor, idiot. You’re intelligent enough to come up with a way without getting any of you into trouble.” 

Tooru just watches his boyfriend eating pancakes without even looking up while talking about drugs. 

“You are terrible and I’m glad you aren’t a professor and only cut people open.” 

He will never get tired of Hajime’s lazy morning smiles. 

The sound of a locker falling shut echoes through the empty hallway and Tooru can watch so many different expression twirl over the students face. Shock, annoyance, shock, fright, anger, anxiety. 

“I need to confiscate that,” he says with extended arm and a smile that says ‘I have the power to let terrible things happen’. 

A weight falls into his opened hand and now there’s only anger on the student’s face who probably has a new most-hated teacher. 

Tooru always expected weird things to happen, but he could have never guessed to use his position to get to drugs from one of his students and then casually walk come with the package filling his pocket out.

Weirdly enough, he doesn’t feel like doing something or frightened by being caught. 

“Guess what I got,.” he screams through the flat before the door even has the chance to fall into the frame. 

Hajime and he sit down onto the balcony and Tooru pulls the small transparent bag out of his pocket. Three joints are literally smiling at him, urging him to do it. 

Before even taking his first drag, his mouth hurts of smiling. 

“I never thought I would start smoking pot in my thirties. Always thought I would be spared of that.” 

After their shared joint is burnt down Tooru can slowly feel ants crawl under his skin and he’s coughing horribly. Hajime just laughs at him.

“Excuse me that my parents warned me from drugs. They also warned me from people like you.” 

Seemingly, the drug already kicked in for Hajime. Tooru can see in his eyes that he’s somewhere entirely else, smiling like the mad hatter. 

Slowly, he can feel a fit of coughing creeping up on him. Which isn’t all that good because he too is smiling like a lunatic. After a few seconds of uncontrollable coughing, Tooru feels tears stinging behind his eyes, but he can’t stop laughing, much to Hajime’s amusement. 

Slowly but surely Tooru feels affected by the drug too. Invisible strings pull the corners of his mouth up and happy piano music starts playing in his head. 

He watches the ever same constellations in the sky, but with the difference of now seeing new things. In the Big Dipper he can see Hajime making him coffee while looking more tired and cute than usual, the pegasus shows him the two of them slowly dancing in the kitchen and Aquarius withholds a kiss. 

For Tooru, it feels like memories, like he has known Hajime for all his life.

His head rolls to the right and he watches the stars twinkle in his lover’s eyes. Hajime takes his hand and they just sit and listen to the buzzing city below them while time has no value for them anymore. 

The only thing that’s currently important to Tooru is that Hajime is beside him, extracting so much warmth, Tooru feels like sitting beside the sun. Even though the sun isn’t nearly as bright as him.

 

Smoke and ashes fill the air. A thick brick wall is built up in front of Tooru and then he passes out. 

As he wakes up again Hajime is shaking him awake. 

“Tooru. You hung up aluminium foil again.”

He doesn’t sound angry, just disappointed. 

A feeling of dizziness overcomes him and he realizes he passed out on the floor. Rubbing his head he sits up and apologizes. 

Finally opening his eyes and looking around, he sees what he has done. 

Everything is clad in aluminium foil. From the books in the shelve to the lamp on the table. Everything is glistening dangerously metallic. 

“Did I do that?”

Silence is filling the room, every noise echoes three times through the room before it’s finally choked by silence. 

“Yes. Tooru. I don’t know how much longer I can do this.” 

A burning sensation spreads through his body, pushing against his eyes. 

He wants to hold onto Hajime, but he gets up and just looks down at him. 

Tooru can’t move his legs, he can’t get up to stop him. 

Smoke oozes from the ground, coating Hajime fully. Flames lick out of the foil, catching everything they can reach until Hajime is swallowed whole. 

Noises start to build up. Metal clashing against metal, explosions and screams of pure agony. It gets louder and louder and Tooru can just sit in his room of aluminium foil, watch the flames takeaway what he loves and listen to the aching screams echoing around him. 

And then he wakes up. 

Slowly, his eyes adjust to the darkness consuming the room. He can see the mere outlines of furniture, the familiarity of those exact outlines calming him. 

Tooru can feel his hair sticking to his sweaty forehead and neck. With trembling digits he tries to get them away. 

A clicking sound echoes through the room and then there is light and his eyes need to adjust again. 

“Is everything okay?” 

Hajime is there with his sleepy, raspy voice, all worried. 

“I just had a nightmare.” 

Tooru twists and turns the silk sheets between his fingers. 

“Another one? That’s the third this week. What happened?” 

He tugs harder at the sheets, afraid they will tear. 

“It was the same as always. You were there and wanted to go. Then there was fire and you were gone and there were horrible sounds. Like a house burning down and screaming. It was so loud.” 

Tooru’s breathing is rapid, the breaths too short to be healthy, so he takes a deep one first. 

“I don’t want to go back to sleep. I don’t want to see these things.” 

“Tooru, you need to sleep. I’m here and I won’t leave you. Please, get some rest. You can’t conceal those eyebags any longer,” Hajime smirks and Tooru can’t help huffing a laugh. In the short time he has been here, Hajime has already learnt that in situations like this, laughing is the best for Tooru. 

They go back to sleep and Tooru is spared from another nightmare, but the next morning he wakes up to an empty bed. 

It’s unusual. Normally, he leaves before Hajime. There is always a chance of an emergency in the hospital, so Tooru doesn’t worry and starts his day like always, with a cup of coffee as big as his hands. 

The cup was a thoughtful present from Bokuto, who thought Tooru needs an extra sized one. So he made it himself. And it’s great, maybe a little askew, but perfect. Bokuto just painted a galaxy on it with black holes, supernovas and other spacy things. But Tooru had complained because no aliens were on it.

He cradles the mug in his hands and smiles at the warm memory, before getting ready for work. 

As much as he loves his job, it’s tiring sometimes. The jackass kid from his class seriously asked him what the theory of relativity actually means. Tooru wanted to crash his head against the desk right there and then. 

Sometimes his students give him a headache. A bad headache. 

Coming home, he just wants to roll up in his bed, preferably with Hajime, but he still needs to create a surprise exam for his graduation class and prepare his next lessons. 

And he thought school work ended after university. Why did he become a professor again? 

When he finally does comes home, Hajime still isn’t there. 

And the day after. 

And the day after. 

To say Tooru is worried is the understatement of the year. Every second he doesn’t get a sign from Hajime makes him want to rip all of his hair out.

He can’t concentrate on his work, which is problematic to say the least, because one of his classes is going to graduate soon and he has to prepare them for their final exam. He would be filled with so much guilt if they failed.  
So he tries to take his mind off the topic. 

He hasn’t had a nightmare the past night, hasn’t heard things or seen things. It has to be a good sign. Maybe the aftershock is finally wearing off. 

He also feels stupid for all of his conspiracy theories. 

A ringing rips him out of his thoughts and with a hammering heart fueled by hope, he picks it up. 

It’s Ushijima. God knows how much he has called Tooru since they had seen each other last time. 

Tooru always declined his calls, always shrugged him off, because he knows exactly that he just wants to make Tooru go to the psychologist again. 

But he is so much better, he can even see how fucked up all his theories were. After realizing that, he threw all the aluminium foil out he possessed. 

It feels like something is eating him up from the inside. 

Hajime still hasn’t left any trace about his being. 

Tooru begins to worry. Really worry. So he uses his day off and calls into every hospital he knows and even more. 

Nothing. 

Then he calls Ushijima finally back. Surely not because he wants to thank him for the great advice to go to the soul plumper. 

The phone rings once, twice and Tooru is already afraid everyone just left. 

“Oikawa? It’s good to finally hear from you. You’ve missed your last appointment. And didn’t show any sign of life after.” 

Somehow, Tooru doesn’t really feel like talking anymore. 

“Well, I was busy. Sorry. But I have a question.” 

“Okay, go on.” 

“Is there currently an Iwaizumi Hajime at the hospital? Could you look?” 

A static silence builds up after the words left his mouth. Tooru hears nothing. Neither the paging through papers nor the hitting of keyboards. 

He feels like the silence wants to swallow him whole. 

“Ushiwaka?” 

“Pardon. I just asked one of the secretaries,” another stretched pause. Tooru guesses he isn’t fond of sharing private information, “she said no.” 

Tooru’s heart falls a little more. Two or three hospitals more and it will hit the ground. 

“Thanks though, see you.” 

“Toor-” 

Whatever he wanted to say, Tooru will never know. 

He throws the phone to the ground. 

The metallic sound of shattering plastic drives into his bones and probably won’t let him go for two hours. 

For minutes he stares at the wall, trying to persuade himself that he’s only thinking about his next steps. 

Actually, he’s just hopelessly lost and doesn’t know what to do. 

But then he gets an idea. Picking up his not shattered mobile phone, he calls the most repeatedly called number. 

“You need to come over. Bring alcohol with you.” 

Not even fifteen minutes later Kuroo is sitting on his sofa, nursing a bottle of tequila in his hand that’s only half full anymore. 

“What’s even going on with you? It’s always an emergency when you ask me to drink with you.” 

Tooru isn’t sure if the alcohol or the memories are the reason for Kuroo’s stupid grinning. But he’s also too buzzed to really care. 

As gracefully as he can muster, Tooru takes the bottle from his hand and allows the alcohol to burn his throat. 

“I called you to drink with me and not for you to play psychologist.” 

For a few minutes, there’s nothing to be heard except for the ticking of the dozens of clocks and Tooru’s asynchronous tapping on the glass. 

“Am I still the way I was before?” 

From the corner of his eye he can watch Kuroo’s shuffling on the couch, trying to get comfortable in an uncomfortable situation. He scratches the stubbles on his chin while looking everywhere but at Tooru. 

“Yeah. Still the same.” 

Both of them are already singing their sentences and Tooru knows his brain stopped processing the things he currently sees. As it seems he will most likely have a blackout tomorrow. 

With his head rested against the cushion and closed eyes his on the way to finally get a healthy amount of sleep. 

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Opening his eyes again he’s met with a look of pure despair on Kuroo’s face, a look that doesn’t suit him. So he shuts his eyes and drifts off with a hazey smile on his lips. 

Days pass and Tooru just tries to get used to not having someone around again. Accepting what happened is hard. Without a word, Hajime just disappeared, but never really left Tooru. 

His job gives him a little space. There he can take his mind off the topic. There are more serious questions than the one where Hajime is. It hurts to admit it, but the secrets of physics are more important. 

At least he didn’t have a nightmare for the past weeks. Dealing with those on his own would have been fatal. Same goes with seeing and hearing stuff. Hajime was always there right beside him. Tooru confided in him. 

He scratches the formula on the test in front of him. Really. Why doesn’t his class get the abbreviations. It’s their first year, so he can turn a blind eye. 

A gaze to the clock tells him he’s been correcting tests for the past two hours. Which isn’t that bad, the actual bad thing is that he’s still not finished. Concentrating is hard when your thoughts always want to spiral off. 

He puts his glasses down and buries his face in his hands. Correcting tests at night is always a stupid idea. Why does he always do that. 

A knock on the door startles him. Putting the glasses on, he gets to his feet. It could be Hajime.

He bolts to the door and immediately opens it, totally forgetting his umbrella. 

Bokuto and Kuroo stand in his door frame and Tooru’s heart falls. 

“We need to talk.” 

Because it’s not weird enough that they appear in front of his door at 12 am, Bokuto is holding a carton full of stuff. 

Tooru is more confused than he has ever been. He lets them in and they disappear in the living room. 

There’s a strange tension in the room. Like the drop of a match could inflame the air. So Tooru holds his breath and sits down onto the sofa beside Kuroo. 

Bokuto sits in front of them on the floor, the carton between them.

“What’s going on?” 

Damn him and his nervous stuttering. 

“Before we begin,” Bokuto speaks more silent than usual, more deliberated, “you need to know that we all love you and that we did whatever we did because of that.” 

“Okay, you are scaring me. What’s up?” 

Tooru can’t help smiling because this situation is fucked up and they look so serious and the carton is ridiculously stuffed and they look so sad. 

Tooru really has the worst coping mechanism. 

“Ushijima called us. He said you wanted to know if there is an Iwaizumi Hajime in the hospital.” 

Like a frightened animal, Tooru stops breathing. Anticipation tingles like ants under his skin and he starts fumbling around his clothes. 

Soft cotton glides calmingly through his fingers. 

“Please, just sit and listen for a moment, we will give you all the answers, but please. Just be silent and listen for a while.” 

 

“It’s good that he remembers you. It’s a good sign,” Tetsurou heard the scratching of a ball pen being dragged over paper, “do you want to tell him?” 

The doctor eyed him requesting and Tetsurou had never encountered a more slimy sack of slime. Slicked hair and cold blue eyes. Typical doctor asshole with the same amount of feelings as a trash can. 

“No, we can’t tell him.” 

Tetsurou decided it right there and then. Bokuto looked at him with wide eyes and he knew what this gaze meant: Did you get totally psycho bonkers?

It’s the right decision, he told himself, it’s to protect Oikawa. 

The doctor nodded and walked away to his next patient.

“Bokuto,” he grabbed him by the shoulder so all his undivided attention was pointed at him, “you need to go into Oikawa’s flat and let every trace vanish. Don’t throw it away. Put it into the card boxes you still have when I moved and store it in my flat. You know where the keys are.” 

Bokuto nodded maybe a little too apathetic. Tetsurou should have known their plan won’t work out. But Bokuto did it anyways. 

For a while Tetsurou just sat beside Oikawa’s resting body, trying not to bite his fingernails off. With little success. 

Sometime later Bokuto came in, drained in sweat, looking more exhausted than he should and Tetsurou isn’t sure if it’s emotionally or physically conditioned. 

They just nodded to each other and Bokuto sat down. Then, the second part of Tetsurou’s already thoughtful plan began: They needed to tell everyone who could be dangerous about it.

“Did you delete the messages from his phone? Pictures and everything?” 

Bokuto looked more stressed and Tetsurou was so sorry for him. 

“Yeah. Was able to get into his phone with Kozume’s help and we didn’t leave any trace.”

After a longer pause Bokuto spoke up again. 

“Kuroo, this feels so wrong. We shouldn’t do this.” 

Tetsurou was used to the glimmer of childish innocence in Bokuto’s eyes, but never has he seen it mixed with fear. 

He would have been lying, if he had said he didn’t know what he was talking about. Bokuto wasn’t the only one whose stomach performed backflips over and over again. 

They stayed in the little room until Oikawa woke up and went to his appointment. Tetsurou stayed until he was back, packing up his stuff while Bokuto already went to the car. 

Tetsurou thought it was a good idea to get dinner together and talk a little. Also, they managed to talk Oikawa into visiting his parents, who already been taken care of, too. They shouldn’t be a threat to their plan. 

At first Tetsurou was a little shocked they agreed to the plan, but as it seems they have the same opinion as him and just wanted to protect their child.

While Oikawa was away, they planned to mature their plan even more. Just in case, because Tetsurou is a very cautious man. 

He tried to check on Oikawa as many times as his job allowed him to. When he came back from his parents he wanted to be nice and cook for him. He didn’t expect to be confronted with a near death experience. But he also realized then that their plan won’t work, because Oikawa’s paranoia was already back. 

He tried to play it cool, but his words came out more hesitant than he wanted them to. Their plan will backfire and he’s the one responsible for it. 

He and Kenma only worsened Oikawa’s already odd behaviour by hacking his phone and frightening him. In hindsight, Kuroo felt so bad his stomach churned. He clenched his jaw and swallowed his mistake. 

And after that he nearly attacked Akaashi too.

Tetsurou was sure he made the wrong choice.

But some things are too hard to speak off.

 

“You were diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder. You had it since you were around fifteen. We decided it’s the best to not tell you, we had a chance of it just going away after the accident, but it didn’t. We noticed after you were so scratched when Kenma hacked your phone an-” 

Tooru breaks through Kuroo’s stream of words by abruptly getting to his feet, looking at him with eyes that could turn people to stone. 

“You fucking lied to me. You had no right to do that. This is my life, you assholes. Do you even know how dangerous and careless this was? I didn’t take my meds, I could have hurt myself, or even others!” 

Yes. He remembers. Remembers the times when he tried so many different meds his whole head was messed up. Or how his parents reacted. They just hugged him and promised it will be fine. And now the decision of knowing such an important part about himself was taken away from his “friends”. And everyone played along.

Unnoticed, he starts raising his voice until it feels like his vocal cords will tear. 

His whole body is shaking from anger and it spreads uncontrollable through his body like a wildfire. Hot tears burn behind his eyes and Tooru does no longer feel able to hold them back.

“How do you even dare.” 

It’s a mere whisper, sounding like shattering glass before he gives in and tears like hot embers start to roll down his face. 

He wants to turn and get away, but Kuroo notices and grabs his sleeve, pulling him back onto the couch. He wants to pull Tooru into this arms, but he jerks away as far as he can. 

“Don’t touch me!” he shrieks. 

“Oikawa, we are so sorry, really,” Tooru didn’t notice. Bokuto and Kuroo are also crying silent tears, “but there is more we need to tell you.”

Bokuto’s voice overturns. 

“More! What more? What else did you do! Or better, didn’t do! I fucking hate yo-”

“Shut up now!” Kuroo’s voice sounds so solid, it could cut through glass. Tooru shuts up immediately and stops sobbing. 

“This is hard to tell you! It was always hard to tell you, that’s why we decided it’s the best to just not do it. Your amnesia did help a lot with that.” 

Tooru’s mouth is hanging open and there’s nothing he can do. He wants to scream at Kuroo and Bokuto, get them as far away from him as possible, but his body just won’t respond to anything. 

Kuroo combs a hand through his black stands in desperation, obviously trying to find the right words. He’s constantly muttering “fuck” whereas Bokuto just remains on the floor, sobbing. 

“The accident,” Kuroo stobs ruffling his hair and folds his hands in his lap, avoiding looking at Tooru at all costs, “you weren’t alone in the car.” 

Tooru gulps as his brain fills with questions he doesn’t even want the answer to. 

“Someone was sitting with you in the car. They didn’t survive.” 

Tooru can’t breathe, his lungs pull together and somehow he feels like he has lost his mind. Without any energy or feelings left, he just sits there and listens. 

“Who was it, who did I kill?” 

His voice sounds distant and more calm than he would like it to. The cold leads shivers down his spine. 

“Your boyfriend,” Kuroo gulps as if swallowing the feelings currently contradicting his actions, “Iwaizumi Hajime.” 

Slowly, he turns his head to look at Kuroo, his face showing nothing more than confusion.

“That’s not possible. I only met him after the accident, when we went to get dinner. We dated but he disappeared a few weeks ago.” 

Tooru shakes his head repeatedly, denying everything he just heard and without words, Bokuto puts the box onto his lap. 

Trembling fingers search through its contents only to find framed pictures, books and other things that look like sentiments. 

Tears fall uncontrollably onto the things, smearing the ink on pictures. 

Tooru strokes over one old looking picture. It’s blurred and Tooru can see that he took the picture while seemingly jumping onto Hajime’s back. Blinding smiles are plastered onto their faces. Tooru guesses it’s from their highschool time and he can’t get how he was able to forget him so long. But one by one, memories fill his head.

He remembers when they spent time on top of the roof when it was hot, how Tooru forced him to look at the stars nearly every night, how they got together, both undeniably clumsy and awkward, how they had their first alcohol experience together, which ended with Hajime holding his hair back, how Hajime always supported him through all his psychoses, manias and depression.

A new wave of tears starts to build up in his eyes. 

“How dare you to do such a thing to me. Where is all his stuff?” 

He raises his voice until his vocal cords are straining. Tooru knows his face is bloated and has red blotches from crying. Desperation must be intensified in his eyes, as if it belonged there since the beginning. 

“We told everyone about it and brought his things into my apartment.” 

“You deleted a human life, a life I loved. You even went as far as to manipulate my whole life.” 

He’s hiccupping in between words, making it hard to be understood, be he doesn’t care. 

He wants to scream so many things at them, but stroking his finger over the photograph takes all the energy he has left. 

“You have to understand. We didn’t want your memory to come back, so we hid it. We weren’t able to know that you have such strong psychoses. Isn’t it painful? Wouldn’t it have been better if you had never known?” 

Wouldn’t it have been better if you had died?

Hair is sticking to his sweaty, tear smeared skin and his face is scrunched up from the pain. The time has come where he no longer has any control over what he’s saying. 

“Get out, let me grieve, because you even took my time to grieve away from me. And don’t you dare come back.” 

Tooru forces his gaze onto the picture in his hands, he can’t bear looking at them. 

Slowly and without a word, they get up and slouch out of the apartment. Tooru holds his posture until he hears the door fall into the lock.

Only then hell breaks loose. He starts screaming and crying all at once, completely forgetting to breathe. It’s like he has no control over his actions anymore. 

One by one he takes the clocks from his wall and throws them on the ground, the sound of shattering glass and metal on wood strangely calming. 

Time doesn’t have any meaning to him anymore. 

Without caring for the noise, his neighbours calling the police or cutting his feet with the shattered glass he wanders over to the couch again. 

The screaming stopped, but his breaths are short and too frequent, as if he has a hummingbird as heart. 

He takes the things out of the box and throws them on the ground. He’s sure that he will regret doing that later, but right now, it helps. 

Silence would only slaughter him right now. 

One after one the memories crash onto the floor. Tooru is disgusted by the smiles in the pictures and he isn’t sure who he’s angry at. 

Bokuto and Kuroo because they are good friends, but lying? Hajime because he is the love of his life, but dead? Himself because he wasn’t able to drive safely?

Lastly, he grabs a fist sized plastic replica of Venus, because it was his favorite planet. Examining it while turning it around, he can feel the summer breeze on his skin again, hear the music and smell the sweets from the funfair where Hajime won the thing for him. 

He clenches his fist and throws it against the wall, just to watch it break. 

 

He opened his eyes just to look into Hajime’s worried face, which immediately turned to delighted. 

“Morning. How does it feel to spend the night on the floor?” 

His cheeky smile really bothered him at that time. Sitting up, his spine cracked with every move, followed by all the other joints in his body. 

“Sorry, there was an emergency at the hospital, couldn’t get away,” softly he stroked through Tooru’s hair, who was still pouting beside the loving gesture, “how did that happen?”

Tooru shook his head, looking around confused. Seems like he had started to hang aluminium foil up again, but he didn’t get far. 

He answers with a shrug. 

“Guess my subconsciousness told me not to do it, but my will told me to do it. So I took sleeping pills and passed out.” 

“I think we will spend the day with putting it down again.” 

Tooru shook his head. 

“No, they are watching us. We can’t hang it down. I’m only trying to protect us. Don’t you understand?” 

Hajime closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath before standing up. 

“I don’t know how much longer I can do this.” 

He ruffles through his hair and Tooru’s heart sank. He wanted to get up but couldn’t. Hajime wasn’t even looking at him. 

“We can’t keep buying foil. We could just build aluminium foil blinds. That way you wouldn’t have to hang it up everytime.” 

Tooru released a breath he wasn’t aware he has been holding and everything stops. Did he understand that right? He smiled and Hajime helped him up. 

Tooru kissed his cheek and already started putting the foil down. 

Over the day, his psychosis only worsened. Everytime he lost Hajime out of sight and found him again, he had to prove he wasn’t a spy and the real one.

Their neighbours then started to move their furniture again and Hajime wanted to damn them for their timing. Tooru of course heard it despite the volume of the music. Armed with a baseball bat he wanted to run to them and show them the door. 

Hajime gave him his meds and Tooru slept. It wasn’t what he wanted to do, but sleeping through a psychosis is better than living through it. 

He called Tooru’s psychiatrist then and got an emergency appointment. 

The balcony door behind him opened and arms slung around his middle. He felt Tooru’s hot breath against his neck, sending goosebumps over his skin. 

“I don’t like it when you smoke.” 

“I don’t like it when you are like this.” 

The arms pulled back and Tooru got some proximity between them. Protectively, he slung his arms around himself. 

“What do you mean?” he asked frightened. 

“No, I didn’t mean that, forget it.” 

Hajime pressed the palm of his hand against his eye, watching out for the cigarette to not burn his hair. 

“I know what you meant. When I’m like this. When I’m weird again, seeing and hearing things. When I’m sick again.” 

Hajime dropped the cigarette in the tray and took Tooru by his shoulders. 

“Yes, you are exhausting sometimes, but that doesn’t change the fact that I love you. Why else would I be here anymore? Now get dressed, we have an appointment.” 

Hajime didn’t have to say which appointment, there was only one possible answer. He went back inside, beating himself up about his stupidity and saying things like this. Tooru lingered a little more on the balcony before walking in and getting ready. 

“I’m driving.” 

Tooru snatched the keys out of Hajime’s hand. He wanted to say no, say that he’s not in the condition to drive, but he didn’t want to anger Tooru any more. So he left it at that and followed him to the car. 

Hajime kept staring at the hole in their car front where a radio should have been. Tooru ripped it out during one of his psychoses.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.” 

Hajime looked at his profile, at the sun highlighting his features and his concentrated expression and it hit him right there and then that he couldn’t love anyone else. He has been attached to Tooru since the beginning. 

“Don’t you think we should end this?” 

Tooru bit his lip after he spoke just to conceal the twitching of the corners of his mouth. 

“Of course I don’t. I love you, why should I want to do that?” 

“Because you are unhappy.” 

Never before did Hajime want the radio back as much as then. The silence was suppressing, pushing against his chest. 

“I’m not.” 

“Yes, you are!” 

Tooru screamed, looking off to Hajime with a wildfire spreading in his eyes. 

“Look at the street,” he screamed back as Tooru turned his head again and Hajime turned the steering wheel around. 

A loud noise was heard then, different materials crashing into each other and Hajime smelled something burned. Not knowing what just happened, he opened his eyes again. 

His ears were ringing and people screamed, sounding as if they were underwater. 

With a blurry vision he searched for something like a fixing point. To his left, he found one. 

Tooru’s eyes fluttered open and Hajime saw the blood running down his head. He also noticed the pain he felt while breathing. 

Something coppery and icky started running out his mouth. It didn’t drip down his chin, but ran all the way over his face, past his eye and he realized their car is laying on the roof. Tooru responded to the sight with repeated broken shoutings of his name.

His own eyelids started to flutter again and he saw more black spots than anything else. He knew that his pulse was low and that he was running out of time. 

With the left strength, he opened his mouth. 

“I love you, don’t forget.”

He wanted to reach out to Tooru, only wanted to lift his arm, but it sent such a shocking pain through his body, he pulled it back. Hajime closed his eyes and listened to Tooru’s voice. 

“I swear to God, keep your eyes open or I will be really mad at you, please, Hajime, stay with me.” 

Tooru’s voice was high pitched from fright, sounding like he would break any minute. Hajime could hear him trying to wiggle out of his seat. 

A wave of pain overcame his body and only then he realized the agony coming from his stomach. A part of the car had bored into his stomach. Hajime shut his eyes and hoped Tooru wasn’t able to see it. He would pass out from pain soon. Shivers wandered down his body and Hajime knew Hypothermia was currently kicking in. 

Slowly, Tooru’s voice sounded fainter and fainter the more he talked. Hajime shook his head as if to say sorry. 

For a last time he opened his eyes just to look into the blubbery face of his lover. Blood, tears and snot, all of it is mixed on his face. He looked devastated and Hajime still couldn’t think of him as anything beside beautiful.

He opened his mouth and started moving his lips, realizing too late that his voice gave up. 

He heard Tooru’s bone shattering scream and then he felt so cold. 

Tooru will never hear the laugh that was able to let phloxes bloom ever again. 

 

The memories of the fateful evening come back and Tooru feels like dying. He’s drained from all of his emotions and dried out. Crying seems like something impossible to him at the moment. 

Motionless and without a plan he remains on his couch while his heart feels like exploding.

But then he notices something on the floor is catching the light, twinkling lightly in the dark. 

Without thinking about it, Tooru gets up and kneels down before the light. 

The Venus replica is broken in two halves. One of the hemispheres is hollow, but the other is stuffed with a cushion. 

Feelingless fingers take the source of the twinkling out of it and when he opens his palm to look at it, a ring rests peacefully in his hand and he breathes out loudly.

Tooru sees something engraved on the inside of the ring: May not even death do us part.

His face scrunches up and he smiles with twitching corners of his mouth at the irony on the engraved ring. Oh how right Hajime was. 

Only thinking about his name sends a new wave of desperation over him. Tooru can’t even feel his heartbeat anymore. Everything plainly hurts. 

He clenches the ring and again, tears roll down his face, but he’s smiling. Maybe from despair, because what else should he do? 

His whole frame is quaking like he’s in the middle of an epicentre. It does feel like it. Within one hour hour his whole world fell apart. 

He puts the ring on and it fits perfectly, the simple white stone glistens in the light. 

“You found it.” 

Tooru’s eyes widen and he flips his head around. Hajime is standing behind him. 

He inches away from him until his back hits the wall. 

“You’re not real! Go away. Please.” 

Steadily his words get more silent. He feels like his heart is shortly before ripping apart. Hajime just keeps tugging at it. 

He comes closer and crunches down in front of him. Lifting an arm he pushes Tooru’s hair back. Pressed against the wall as much as he can, Tooru is breathing like a trapped rabbit. He can swear he felt Hajime’s hand against his skin. 

“I can’t believe you’ve forgotten me.” 

Hurt hushes over Hajime’s, no, his hallucination’s, face, Tooru can’t bear looking without breaking in two himself. 

He plays with the ring on his finger and clenches his eyes shut, holding his breath. 

“Please, try to be happy without me. I don’t want to see you like this for the rest of your life,” Tooru can feel lips being pressed against his forehead and hands on each side of his head, holding him in place, “I love you, don’t forget.” 

When he opens them again, Hajime is gone and the feeling of finality hangs in the air. 

The tears haven’t stopped streaming down his face and now that he’s gone, Tooru notices his loss. Even though Hajime is dead, he was still at his side, he still had what he needed, even though it was only in his head, it was real there. He wants him back, no matter in which form, he doesn’t want to be alone. 

He can hear his lover’s laugh not only fill his head, but the whole room.

Tooru realizes, that there is nothing sadder in this world, than the death of an illusion.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my Beta for doing this on such a short notice. You're the best. <3 [thelabours](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelabours)
> 
> Btw. Phloxes are flowers and mean "Our souls are united" in the language of flowers. 
> 
> Don't be a dick and leave a comment or kudo if you liked it, thanks. <3


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